


Pokémon Chronicles: A Hero's Rebirth

by Eric566



Series: Pokémon Chronicles [1]
Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon - All Media Types, Pokemon, Pokemon Mystery Dungeon
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst and Humor, F/M, Mystery, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-04
Updated: 2017-07-13
Packaged: 2018-10-14 18:52:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 45,800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10542453
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eric566/pseuds/Eric566
Summary: A world where the sun never rises, the wind never blows, and those who inhabit it go mad from despair... in a world like this a trio of friends attempt to go back in time to prevent it all, but unexpected events take place, and their plans are foiled by forces whose intentions are not clear. In another time, but in the same world, an adventure like no other is about to begin: a race against time and to try and prevent an ancient evil from resurfacing and destroying the world once and for all. But not everything is what it seems: the expected series of events, the normal story of this world, become twisted and change... From different corners of the world, many will unite to face the dangers that threaten their world, and whether they succeed or not... is up to them.





	1. Prologue - The Darkest Storm

**Author's Note:**

> Some important things before we start:
> 
> This fic and its introduction was conceived and written on the 30th of June of 2014, and was published soon thereafter on Fanfiction. This is another publication of said fic on this website, Archive of our Own. I am the original author of this work, Eric566, do not let anyone else convince you otherwise. That being said, I do not own Pokémon or the Mystery Dungeon games and their plots, some elements of the which are used for this fic.
> 
> This story has, what you could say, a soundtrack. While reading you may find the titles of songs in brackets and in bold letters. If everything works properly (and I'm not a complete doofus, like always), if you click these another tab should open to YouTube and play the song automatically. If that isn't the case, then please right click the title and tell it to open in another window. This is purely optional, however, you are free to read this fic in whatever way you see fit, I just thought it would make for an interesting detail. All of the songs are owned by their respective studios and producers and anyone who worked on them, and I do not intend to make any profit.
> 
> And lastly, this is the first time I have ever worked with this website, so please expect all types of mistakes regarding formatting and HTML. I am sorry in advance, these will all be fixed as soon as I get the hang of it.
> 
> Now, without any further ado, I shall let you begin.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Broken promises and lies. The two meet and once again clash.

 

**Prologue**

**–**

**The Darkest Storm**

 

The sky was pitch black. No stars, no moon, no clouds. Nothing. It felt like he was staring into an eternal void of darkness. He lowered his vision, glancing at his surroundings. They had decided to stay in a little forest which was in the middle of the mountains. They only had to cross over the mountain and they would be there. Or so Celebi said, because they had been walking around those mountains for... He didn't even know how long they had been walking around aimlessly and even if he tried, he wouldn't know either. Time didn't exist anyway. Yes, as weird as it sounded, even for someone like him, time didn't exist in that world. It was all in black and white too, and even to him it felt really strange, as if he was in an old cartoon, though he had learned to try his best and ignore the laws of certain worlds a long time ago.

And this world was no different.

He had been to many worlds which weren't populated by humans. Sometimes weird creatures like dragons or talking normal animals. Sometimes there were humans that lived peacefully with these creatures, sometimes they lived not so peacefully... But never in his life had he imagined he would stumble upon a world with pokémon. They were fascinating creatures, in the sense that there were so many species of them. They ranged from dogs, to cats, and even lizards and birds, and all of them with their own individual consciousness and personality... Hell, depending on the area, even languages and superstitions. There were so many species that maybe he would have to recompile them in a book once they got done and over with what they were doing.

But, with this amazing variety of animals and creatures also came a slight feeling of loneliness… well for anyone else in his place, that would be. Being the only human in a world wasn't a really hot feeling at all, but he was glad that he didn't have to put up with them. They already had enough jerks in pokemon form, dealing with humans would’ve probably made things a little bit more interesting… and violent too, but he couldn’t blame them. After all, he was a human himself, at least in the physical sense of the word, of course. He looked at the fired in front of him, and decided to remind himself who he was, and how he was there, just so that he wouldn’t lose his focus and be carried away by his thoughts.

He had a name which he used to refer to himself, and told everyone else around him to use when they talked to him, and that name, was Eric.

He was around 2 meters tall, albeit slightly taller than that, with a strong build from all the exercise he was forced to do daily: fighting, running, jumping… His white skin didn't let him camouflage well with the shadows, but his clothing made up for this. His feet were cozy inside his dark blue sneakers, the sole of which was white, with orange lines all over them, giving them a fresher edge that the human liked. Those weren’t his only pair, of course, but as of now, that was what he had on.

His sea blue trousers were really flexible, though at first glance they looked like normal jeans. At that moment he was wearing a red sweatshirt, on top of which he was wearing a black jacket, which was unzipped, even though it was really cold, as it would be in a world where the light of the sun didn’t particularly shine down thanks to the moon that obstructed it; so he liked to leave it like that, hanging loosely from his shoulders, waving with his every move.

The jacket had white lines all over it, and they all ended up making the silhouette of a five-pointed star on the back of the jacket. His head and neck were bare of any accessories or headgear, and thanks to the dim light that the fire in front of him let out, one could see his black hair, and hazel eyes staring back at the flames. However, inside one of the inner pockets of his jacket, he had a pair of shades, which he would pull out every so often whenever the sunlight was too intense that it would make fights more difficult, or when he just wanted to show off. More often than not, the wore them for the later reason.

What made him different from other humans, however, were the markings he had on the back of his right hand. He looked at it, nostalgically. It was a tattoo of the outline of a white five pointed star, just like the one on his back, although unlike that one, this one was surrounded by a circle.

Also unlike the one on his jacket, there were ten smaller circles around it, inside of which he could see the outlines of shapes in different colors. A purple vortex, a red flame, a dark blue water drop, three brown spikes, a light green tornado, a light blue snowflake, a yellow thunderbolt, a dark green leaf, a violet four point star and an orange hourglass. However, only the flame was crimson colored. The other symbols were greyed out, though the original colour remained. He examined the tattoo in it's entirety. That very same mark was a blessing for some…

But for him, it was a curse. A reminder that he would never be what he wanted... A reminder of his place in existence... A reminder of what he had lost... And a reminder of his duty. He stared at the rest of his hand nostalgically, trying to remember when that blasted thing wasn't there. Then again... did a time like that even exist, or had he been born with that thing plastered on his skin? He didn't remember, nor did he want to remember, for delving into his past was... dangerous, to say the least.

He heard the grass rustling to his left. In one swift move, he placed his right hand on the log he was sitting on and boosted himself up, slightly above ground, whilst a flash of light enveloped his left hand, where a golden bow manifested itself. There were white lines over it, decorating the weapon. A red gem was encrusted in a part of the metal where he could put arrows. Once he landed on the ground, he placed two fingers from his right hand in this spot and pulled them back, an arrow appearing between them, his fingers stretching the string, tensing it. He was ready for anything that would pop up from the bushes... But he didn't expect Grovyle to appear, hands above his head.

“Lower that thing dude! It's me!” The pokemon shouted, panicking as he thought that the human would put that arrow between his eyebrows.

Eric sighed and lowered his weapon. “God damn it Grovyle... I didn't know you would come back so early.” He said, turning around, giving his back to the pokémon and sitting back on the log, dismissing the bow, which disappeared in a similar flash of light as the last one.

The grass type smirked. “Eh. I didn't think it would bother you, but as soon as I got close you jolted up from that log. I guess this place is getting to your head, isn't it?” He asked. The grass type approached his human friend and sat on the log. He was just like a normal grovyle, all of his body was green, aside from his belly which was red, with a green line across the middle of it. He had a long leaf coming out of his head, curving backwards and down to his back. This leaf kind of looked like his hair, as it waved with his movement. There were leaves coming out from his elbows, and some coming from his backside, acting like some sort of tail. Both of his arms and legs ended in finger like green claws.

Eric laughed. “You could say that. How long have I been here anyways? Three, four months?” He said, pulling up his fingers each time he said a number.

“Doesn't that pretty clock of yours tell you?” Grovyle inquired, pointing at the human’s jacket, although he was aiming at his pocket. “I've seen you pull that thing out of your jacket one too many times Eric. You’re kind of obsessed with it.” Eric sighed as he pointed out this fact. He put his left hand inside of a pocket in his jacket and pulled out said watch. It was quite big, though not bigger than his hand. It was a golden pocket watch, the top of which was transparent, letting him see the clock hands through the lid, which were spinning around a lot. The base of the clock where the numbers were written had holes, and he could see the gears shifting around like crazy. The bottom of the clock had the same outlined star, just like the one that was on the back of his jacket.

“I always look at this thing in hopes it ACTUALLY works correctly. No luck so far though… I mean, have you seen this thing? Even in the weirdest of conditions I’ve never seen a watch going apeshit like this. It’s almost hypnotizing actually…” Eric commented as he watched the clock hands go round and round. Grovyle however, was way too busy looking behind them and into the cave. Eric smirked, looking at him and showing him the watch. “Yes. Your sleeping beauty is still in there Grovs. Sleeping like a baby. If you want to, we can use this little thing here to hypnotize her and force her to do your every bidding. I’d walk away of course… I don’t need to know what you want to get on with her.” Eric said, a huge smile on his face.

The pokémon blushed at his joke, punching the human’s shoulder with force, Eric eliciting a fake ‘Owch’ noise, chuckling.. “Oh come on, don’t be like that with me bro. You thought you were going to trick me any longer? I can see it in your eyes man.” The human said, smirking. Grovyle scratched the back of his head.

“Well... I guess you read me like an open book. Yeah, she’s… she’s really cute. I… I don’t know how to put it.” Grovyle struggled to find the words to describe what he felt.

Eric smiled. “I've seen this way too many times man, and I can spell it out for you: L-O-V-E. That’s what’s going on here. I can see the light in your eyes each time you look at her... and I also see your look of sadness because you're going to be parting ways with her soon.” As soon as he said this, his partner's face went grim.

“Not only that but... She's a legendary. It's like impossible for her to accept me.” Grovyle answered, suddenly getting depressed and anxious. Eric laughed, however, finding his partner's reaction foolish.

“Really? That's all that's keeping you from telling her? Dude, she may be immortal, but you should tell her anyways, and enjoy the time you have with her. You’re better off living what little time you have left with her knowing the answer to **that** question, than living the rest of your life torturing yourself, wondering if you did the smart thing by not telling her if you were a complete idiot.” Grovyle didn't answer, he just kept looking into the cave. “Do what I do: Live in the present, don’t look back at the past or into the future. Just try to enjoy what you have now and deal with any problems that come up later.” The human said, still receiving no response from the grass type.

Eric got up from the log, sighing as he tucked the watch away into his pocket. “ Alright then… I'm going to scout around and make way for us. You go wake her up.”The human said, walking off down the cliff, but right before he disappeared from view he turned around to face the bonfire. “And give her a good morning kiss too. She’s been snoring away in there since you left.” He said, receiving a response in the form of a middle finger and a smile from Grovyle. Eric held back laughter and turned around, heading into the forest. As soon as the human was out of sight, Grovyle let out a long sigh,then got up and went into the cave to wake up the time controlling pokemon, Celebi.

* * *

 

([Balcony Theme – Resident Evil](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jrAFcwH_rfg))

 

Eric looked around, eyes and ears peeled. He was slowly making his way through the forest, following a forgotten track that was covered in dead leaves and… something else. He couldn’t really see what it was because of the darkness, but it was some sort of sticky layer, probably the leaves in an advanced decomposition state… or maybe something grimier than that. He didn’t want to know. He grasped his bow tightly, an arrow prepared in case anything appeared. He paced around the trees for a while and came up to a group of Ratatta feasting on something. Though he couldn't see through the rats, he could smell something that was rotting. He wasn't really curious on seeing what the main dish was, so he ignored them and kept going.

He always wondered to himself if the world he was in had even been peaceful, because it certainly didn't look like it. All the creatures aside from a few lucky ones had been frozen in time… well, “lucky” was a term he was using loosely in that situation. Those that weren’t caught in the time freeze had managed to go on for a few weeks, or months, years… even with Dialga and Dusknoir doing their thing. But after that time, food became scarce… And that was when things started to get real ugly. Needless to say, the morbidity of the situation hadn’t exactly gone unnoticed, and most of these “lucky” survivors fell victim to another kind of catastrophe: Cannibalism. As for the cannibals,most of them had gone insane and were now roaming around the world, lead by instincts alone, or a Eric liked to say, Primal.

These "primal" pokemon now roamed every single corner of the planet, killing anything in their way just to eat. It was survival of the fittest now, and not the society of peace that he had been told of. However, some had managed to keep their sanity, the only true survivors from the catastrophe. And many of these had sided with the bad ones. If the survivors didn't have enough with pokemon in primal state, there were also Dusknoir and his goons, all lead by the legendary time pokemon, Dialga. The legendary had gone into a Primal state as well, and they believed that his insanity had resulted in the current situation.

Eric had come to that world just in time to help the survivors, but hadn’t gotten to see how everything declined, he got there when everything had gone to hell. They had all figured out that the only way to stop the “time freeze” was to get some artifacts called Time Gears and bring them all to some place called the "Hidden Land". He didn't know where that was though, they would probably have to figure that out later. They needed Celebi's help to travel back in time and fix everything, erasing the future. However that would result in…

A sudden movement next to him interrupted his thoughts. He tensed up and prepared his bow, ready to launch an arrow. A Rattata walked out from the bush, hissing at him. Eric relaxed, but soon realized he had made a mistake, as the pokemon jumped on him, trying to tear his neck... But it didn't even get close to doing so. Eric simply removed his right hand from his bow and grabbed the rat. It began to squeak and move in his iron grip, and it even bit down on his finger. The Rattata thought that it would make the human loosen his hold around his neck. However, Eric didn't even flinch as it's teeth sank in his flesh. He smirked at it, and the rat looked at him, confused. He tightened his grip around it's body, until he heard some of it's bones snap, about to squeeze the life out of it’s weak and pathetic body. He then let it go, the pokemon falling to the floor. He heard it whimper in pain as it slowly limped away. Eric hadn’t expected the Ratatta to be so foolish as to jump on him, even after it had been found, but either way it was over… it probably wouldn’t survive for long unless it found it’s pack soon.

 

**(Stop the music)**

 

The human was unaware of one thing however. Not too far away from that clearing, a bipedal shape was staring at the human from the shadows of the trees. It was tall, and it was covered in a black cloak which obscured the view of it’s face and limbs, although one could easily see that it had two legs, on the which it was standing, and two arms. Under the hood, which covered its face as well, the shape of it’s head was indistinguishable, as if it’s features were intentionally irrecognizable. It wasn’t long before Eric felt it staring at him from the darkness, his eyes gluing to its figure. He prepared his bow, but didn’t aim it immediately, willing to let that thing go without fighting if it didn’t attack.

Eric stared at it with his hazel eyes, and the creature returned the gaze, the tension between the two rising quickly. Eric felt something oozing from that figure, a strange feeling of apprehension and regret, as well as anger, desperation and dread, all of them flowing through his body as he kept his eyes on the cloaked creature. Something inside of his body was screaming at him to raise his bow and fire an arrow straight in between those white eyes with freaky glowing blue irises. But he didn’t do anything, until he saw the figure take a step towards him through the bushes, at which point he smiled.

“You know… I was wondering where the hell you’d been all this time. You were awfully quiet all this time, yet here you are, finally decided to show your ugly face around here.” He said, raising his bow, tensing an arrow. “So… how about it? Want to finish this here and now so we can move onto other places?” He taunted, waiting for his foe’s response, talking to it as if he was an old friend… or a foe.

Just then, however, he heard more noise coming from behind him and he sharply turned around, expecting another rattata to jump. But instead, a Sableye did. Eric immediately reacted and punched the pokemon out of the air with his right fist, slamming the Sableye against the dirt and making it tumble away. The purple pokemon got up, growling and snarling at the human like a beast. It was really short, but it’s claws really made up for it, ashey could cut through flesh very well, and that was something to be afraid of, and their vision made them see clearly even in the most dimly lit spots. Aside from that, the red gems on their backs and chest didn't do anything as far as Eric knew. The Sableye began charging against him, howling out. The human didn't hesitate to aim and shoot an arrow at it, doing so at staggering speeds. The arrow pierced through it’s forehead, right in the middle of it’s gem like eyes. It’s movement completely stopped, the pokemon dropping to the ground right on the spot, dead.

Eric stared at it for a moment, then turned around to face that same shape again… but when he looked at it, it was gone, and instead was greeted by an empty space. He stared at that empty spot in confusion, before he heard a screech from behind him. He turned around to see another Sableye, who was producing this sound, trying to call it’s companions. The sound died down as an arrow pierced through it’s neck, making a small gurgling sound as it tried to breath, the blood and arrow in it’s throat stopping it from doing so, and soon dropped to the ground like a lifeless corpse. Many screeches filled the forest area, revealing the human’s position. “Oh brilliant. Just brilliant!” He shouted out loud before he began running back to the campsite where his companions were.

* * *

 

He finally got to the cave, and he rushed in shouting at the top of his lungs. ” **FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! FUCKIDY FUCK FUCK!** ” Grovyle came to the where he was as the human began picking up their bags with food and, of course, the map, which he pulled out and hid in his jacket. He looked then looked at his partner and threw a sack at him. “Get you things! We’ve gotta move it! They found us!” He shouted.

Grovyle's eyes widened. ”What?! How?!” They heard someone move hastily from inside the cave.”What happened? What did you do?!” Celebi asked as she came to Eric's view. She looked like a fairy, or at least one that Eric had seen in another world, though he didn't remember well, and that wasn’t the time for remembering what pixies or whatever the hell looked like. Her whole body was pink, and her head was round that curved up. She really big green eyes and two antennae coming out her head, which ended in green tips. Her feet didn't have any toes and her hands ended in three fingers. She was actually really small when compared to Eric and Grovyle, and she was flying in mid air thanks to the wings on her back.

“They found us! We gotta move it right now!” The human repeated his orders again. Celebi grabbed everything she could, which was just a small bag with maps in it and they all ran out of the cave immediately. When they were outside Eric noticed sableye climbing up the hill.

He pulled his bag off him and threw it at Grovyle, who grabbed it in the air, shooting his friend an alarmed look. The outsider made his bow appear again and aimed at the purple pokemon. “GO!” He shouted at his friends, who fled as fast as they could, trying to cover as much distance as possible, planning to go over the last bit of the mountain they had to climb and go through the forest. Eric looked down the cliff, the sableyes climbing up by scaling the rocks with their sharp claws.

He aimed his bow down at the one that was the closest and shot an arrow, the projectile piercing through it’s forehead, ending it's life on the spot, the body losing it’s grip on the rock and falling backwards, hitting another pokemon on the way down, screeching being heard as they fell to the forest below, probably to their demise. Eric shot more arrows to those who came close enough to him with incredible accuracy, keeping the pokémon from reaching up to his level. However, soon there were too many for him to shoot, even if he fired arrows as quickly as he could, and was forced to back away from the edge, putting three fingers on the string to create two arrows which he fired simultaneously, both of them hitting their marks.

Eric got far enough to see how the sableye began rushing at him, getting close enough to the human that he was forced to fight in close quarters, one of them lunging at him, the human merely ducking to the side and giving it a punch that sent it flying away, then jumped away once more and fired an arrow at another Sableye that had tried to slice his legs. He looked at the rest of the pokémon, and saw that they were grouping up to attack him all at once. A smile spread across the human’s face, one more Sableye trying to get him, charging in alone. Eric ran up to him and jumped, stomping on it’s face, crushing it’s skull and then boosted himself away, doing a backflip, preparing another arrow.

He brought his fingers back, making an arrow appear and tensing the string. This time though, the arrow was literally on fire, however, small flames licking his hands, even though he didn’t feel them burning him. He waited until his own movement made him face the mob of Sableye once more, and once he saw all of them all bunched up and charging at him, he let go of the arrow. It flew through the air, sticking straight into the Sableye that was spearheading that mob. His body didn’t have time to fall backwards however, for as soon as the arrow hit, a split second later the fire from the arrow spread across it’s entire body, consuming it immediately in a glorious ball of fire that engulfed everything around it in hellish flames with a loud noise,

The fire spread quickly to the others, screaming as they burned alive because of their companion’s spontaneous combustion. The pokémon broke formation as they all ran around in desperation, some rolling on the ground, trying to put out those unnatural flames, whilst others walked off the cliff and fell down to the forest, burning and rolling down the hill. One of them though, kept charging at him, even if it was burning to a crisp as it ran, and tried to pounce on him and light him on fire as well. Eric waited for the last possible moment  and gracefully dodged to the side, the pokemon completely missing him by inches, it’s skin now mostly burned. The human pulled his fingers back and created an arrow on the bow. However he didn't tense the string, as he grabbed the arrow and spun around, stabbing the back of the sableye's neck with it, the pokemon still airborne. The sableye fell to the ground, finally dead as it’s body turned to charred bones behind the human. He contemplated the scene before him, the foul smell of burnt meat lingering in the air. 

He didn’t stick around for too long however. Eric began running after Grovyle and Celebi, following their path down to the forest, rushing into the bushes, following the sounds of screaming and battle. He found the duo shortly after getting into the forest, fighting against another horde of Sableyes. Grovyle brought down his fist to a Sableye’s head, making it kneel down, then turned around and kicked it away, one more jumping at him from behind, the grass type jumping back whilst swinging his right arm at it, razor sharp leaves flying in that direction, scratching and piercing the Sableye’s body. The wounds were too severe for him to keep moving after that, and Grovyle finished it off as it landed on the ground, throwing a leaf through it’s neck. Celebi meanwhile, covered herself and Grovyle with a psychic barrier, whilst using her powers to pick up chunks of trees and rock and hurling them around, or just using her powers to crush and throw them around like ragdolls.

Eric began shooting arrows like crazy, all the projectiles making impact in his enemies, crouching as he ran and grabbing a Sableye by the leg, spinning around and hurling him against a group, standing back up straight again, leaning slightly to avoid an incoming Sableye and fired an arrow at the Sableye he had thrown, following up by stomping on the head of the Sableye he had dodged. Once they finished that off, he turned to look at his friends, seeing Grovyle brandishing a vine whip and slinging around a Sableye whilst Celebi used two psychic blades, which flew near her, to slice and pierce the last few Sableye. Once they were done, the human approached them. “You guys alright?” He asked.

Both of them nodded in response, Celebi pulling out a map from her bag with her psychic powers. “Looks like we’re going to have to take a detour through the forest… Maybe if we make it over that cliff over there we can get back on track.” She said, pointing at the cliff on the map, Eric and Grovyle looking at the real cliff, which was much taller than the one that was drawn.

The human groaned. ”We should've checked that before... But if that’s our only way out of here, then let’s go! I have an idea on how we’re going to get up there.” He said, though didn’t give too many details, mainly because they didn’t have much time to sit around and talk.

They began running through the forest again, shouts and screeches echoing around them as the sableyes began catching up. They kept on running though, trying to cover as much distance as they could, since sticking around would only make the Sableye surround them faster. Eric decided to take a confusing route, choosing a path filled with trees and bushes. He began running through the trees, ducking and jumping over everything that came in his way, holding on to a tree branch and swinging up and forward, doing a somersault in midair, summoning his bow once more and creating a fire arrow, which he aimed at a group of Sableye that were hot on their heels. The fire blowed up behind them, Grovyle and Celebi getting ahead of Eric as the human landed on the ground, rolling in order to keep his momentum and dashing off again after his companions.

He looked back to see the sableye having trouble following him, so he went back to the main path. Grovyle and Celebi followed him, but as they ran behind him, Grovyle saw a large shadow floating between the trees to their right, and the next second he saw a huge fist enveloped in shadows flying towards them. Grovyle shouted in surprise and ducked under the fist, a large figure flying through the trees behind him, Eric turning around and firing an arrow in it’s general direction. After that they came out the woods and into a clearing. In front of them was the face of the cliff, which was much smoother than he had imagined, which would make climbing it much harder than he had envisioned, if not impossible. And to make matters worse, they were completely surrounded.

There wasn't anywhere else to run, as Sableyes appeared from behind all the trees around them, and the trio were pushed against the face of the cliff, having no other choice but to prepare for the fight that was about to come. Eric prepared his bow, Grovyle shook his arms, the leaves on his elbows getting sharp and Celebi tensed up, her eyes glowing.

However, laughter echoed through the air. A laugh all three of them recognized. “Dusknoir!” Grovyle called out, furious. He should’ve recognized him before when they were chasing them. The dark type appeared from behind the Sableyes. He was actually pretty big, considering the size of his goons. His body resembled a bipedal creature with two giant arms, except that his legs were missing, and instead, it looked like he left a trail of darkness, as he was floating in the air.

His whole body was black, with gray hands. He two yellow bands on the mid-sections of both of his arms, as well as two yellow dots on his chest. A yellow line that zigzagged around his body went across his torso. His neck looked like had six projections sticking upwards, gray as his head. He had one red eye, and another yellow band on top of it, with some kind of yellow antenna coming out of his head, which ended in some kind of disk. Finally, there was a transparent white arrow sticking out of his left shoulder, which he pulled out without flinching, smashing it in his right fist.

“You’re a good shot…” He said, Eric giving him a wide smirk. “But still, you were foolish to believe you could evade us! You see how your actions were useless?! You will never be able to “save” this world! If anything, this world needs saving from imbeciles like your kind. I, the great Dusknoir, has managed to hunt you down and trap you like little…” Eric groaned in annoyance. He hated it when they started their monologue.

He looked around, looking at all their enemies, their staggering numbers were overwhelming, even for him, and to make matters worse he only had his bow with him. His staff was still missing, as he had lost it as soon as he had gotten to that world. He then looked at the markings at the back of his right hand. _“I can summon another one, but... that means he'll be able to use it too…”_ He evaluated his options by looking around again. _“There's no way out of here unless I do it. But... which one? For so many guys... I think Hurricane and Tempest would do just fine... But Quake and Tremor could work nicely too…”_ He groaned. _“Can’t decide!”_

He then looked at his friends. “Hey guys... How about you don't listen to this guys' monologue and help me decide.” He said, both of the pokemon looked at him at they snapped out of their trance, confused. They were all ignoring the dark type now.

“Help you with what?“ They asked, the human responding with a smile.

”What do you guys prefer? Two blades that can cut through almost everything or two hammers that can break and shatter whatever they hit?” The human inquired, exposing his options, although both pokémon were confused at his words. They briefly thought about it.

“Well... I think two blades would be better... And you Celebi?” Grovyle answered, then followed up with the same question to his love interest. Celebi looked at him, then nodded.

“If you could cut through these guys it would be really nice.” She responded, raising an eyebrow as she glanced at the human. “But... why are you asking this?” She asked.

Eric smirked. “You guys just wait and see.” He whispered. It was then when Dusknoir noticed they weren't listening to him at all, the ghost type clearly angered by this fact.

“What are you three talking about? I shall have you know, that you were granted your last dying wishes long ago, but I will hear you pleads… I am merciful, after all.” He asked. Eric looked at him. “Was that a joke? Because it was really bad. If you want to know what we’re talking about, then we’re talking about your stupidity. You do know that you gave us enough time to come with a plan, right?” He reminded the ghost type, who frowned.

“What? What sort of plan could you have come up with?! You’re surrounded from every possible angle, you fool! And we kept that little wand of yours under chains, so what else do you possibly think you can do! Just give up and accept your fates, you criminals!” Dusknoir shouted, now angered with the trio’s persistence. Eric created another arrow and grabbed it with his right hand, then dismissed his bow and grabbed the tip of the arrow with his left palm.

He grabbed it tightly, cutting his skin and drawing blood, doing a small cut on his palm, The crimson liquid slowly seeped out of the wound, soon enough his entire left palm covered in blood. His friends, and even Dusknoir were staring at him, extremely confused, but Grovyle recognized what he was doing, and Dusknoir did as well. “Stop!” Duksnoir ordered. But it was too late. Eric began talking in an ancient language, the marks on the back of his hand glowing. A green glow, which originated from the fifth mark when starting from the top and going to the right, the one with the symbol of a tornado. He shouted the words with an open heart as he pronounced an ancient oath.

Suddenly, strong gusts of wind started blowing, spinning around him and ascending to the sky, the light green light on his arm getting even brighter. He put his arms on top of his shoulders as he closed his eyes, as he felt the magic of the wind flow through the world, converging where he was standing as it obeyed his every command. Every living thing around him stared at the human in a mix of surprise, fear and confusion, some Sableye being foolish enough to approach the human, violently flying away as the extreme winds blew them away. He smiled, as he opened his eyes, then howled out as he stretched his arms, separating his hands from his body. The wind picked up all the dust, which obscured the view of anyone outside of that cyclone.  Two flashes of white light were seen, more purple pokémon jumping into the vortex and melting into the dust… Two quick slashes, which slightly parted the wind, and the shapes of the pokémon were sliced into bits, flying up and away in the gust. Finally, the cyclone ended, and Eric stood on the same spot, although he was panting heavily at this point, and held two new weapons with his hands. 

Everyone was staring at him, dumbfounded. Even Grovyle and Celebi were shocked, even though he had seen Eric recite another strange oath when he obtained that golden bow, and Dusknoir was also speechless, as well as intimidated by this showcase of power.

The blades in the human’s hands emitted were golden. The handles had a twisted design, like two brown snakes that were twisting around eachother upwards and up to the golden crossguard, whilst they began in a round pommel, with the same emblem of the wind that was present on the back of Eric’s right hand against a golden background. The crossguard had a peculiar rectangular design, both edges of it ending in a single pointy end that resembled that of a rectangular triangle, though the other end was inverted. Finally, the blades themselves were a meter and a half long, and had a design reminiscent of single edged blades, although both of the edges were just as sharp. One of the edges of the blade extended further than the other, which made the blade end in a peculiar tip with an acute angle. They were pure white, adorned with golden writing in that same language Eric had spoke not too long ago. The blades weren’t designed for stabbing, but rather slicing through foes with ease.

Eric looked at the blades, raising the right one up to his eyes so he could contemplate it from a closer distance, his eyes then focusing on the shapes in front of him. “So... You wanted to know what my plan really was? Here you have it.” He said, pointing that same blade at Dusknoir. “Then say hello to Tempest and Hurricane!” He shouted, slashing the air around him and adopting a fighting stance, raising his right blade above his head and pointing it slightly downwards, whilst he pointed his other blade slightly upwards, keeping it above his waist.

 

([We Are Finally Cowboys [Golden Brown Mix]  – No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPtkA-Oapz8))

 

Dusknoir stared at the weapons the human was holding. He looked intimidating... but smirked, keeping his confidence from before. “You think you're going to be able to get rid of servants with those things? What an idiot… Challenging this entire army to a battle! You've sealed your fate!” He shouted, raising his arm over his head  then lowered it, pointing straight at the trio. “Kill them all!” He shouted. All of the sableye rushed them, all at once.

Eric smirked.”That was a baaad choice…” He muttered. One of the purple pokemon that got the closest to him jumped, but the human quickly turned to face him and slashed his whole body from side to side while it was airborne. The severed body flopped to the ground, blood flowing everywhere as the Sableye’s eyes twitched and groans came out of it’s mouth as it’s life slithered away. Eric was already slashing more sableye's already though, as he was already running into the mob of Sableyes and cut down anything that crossed his path, although their height made it much more difficult than unusual to dispatch them. He began throwing slashes to every single purple colored creature he saw, a vertical slash that launched a corpse upwards, only for Eric to deliver a roundhouse kick a hurling it away. One of the pokemon jumped high up on top of him, but he just had to thrust his sword upwards, impaling the Sableye whilst bringing his blade down on the arms of a Sableye that tried to defend himself.

He then threw the body to more sableyes as he brought the same blade down to another one, cutting it in half and spinning on the spot, the blades cutting clean through everything, letting the momentum of his blades carry him, howling out as he arched his back forward, both of his blades striking another Sableye and then jumped up, spinning sideways in the air as he cut through his victim multiple times as he rose, leaving a trail of blood, then brought down both of his blades as gravity took hold of him again and fell back down to the ground, his swords striking the ground in front of him, a strong gust of wind blowing away everyone in front of him.

Without skipping a beat, he picked himself back off the ground and rushed ahead at blinding speeds, letting the wind carry him as he sliced and spun through the air. He didn’t inmediately kill the last one however, instead jumping off of it’s head and using his wind magic to keep himself aloft, then threw down his sword and impaled the Sableye to the ground with it, the human coming down right after that and stomping on the blade’s hilt, making it jump right out of the ground. Behind him six Sableye all jumped and tried to pounce him, but the human swiftly turned around and kicked the hilt of the blade again, sending it spinning towards them, slicing through and then flying off to the crowd behind them, flying as if it had a mind of it’s own. It didn’t, however, since Eric was in fact controlling the blade with the wind whilst he handled the pokémon that came close to him.

Not too far away from him, both Grovyle and Celebi were fighting like a duo, the Grovyle using is vine whip to topple a couple of Sableyes, spun around with the momentum of the whip and threw sharp leaves at them, piercing their chests and necks, killing them instantly. The vine returned to his hand just in time for him to punch a Sableye out of the air, a leave flying at it right after his fist connected to it’s face, backing away into another crowd. He did a cartwheel and jumped above them, grabbing more leaves from his shoulders and holding them between his fingers, and as he went above the crowd he threw his arms forward and released all the leaves at once, taking care of most of those pokémon. The only one left standing was blown away by a psychic blast before it had a chance to do anything.

Celebi flew in straight after it, two spinning blades with three edges floating after her. She roared out as he blades charged forward and sliced through the Sableye, returning to her to orbit around herself, protecting her from anything that came way too close for comfort. She looked at a tree and snapped one of her fingers, lifting it up with her powers, then threw it into the mob with all her strentgh, the log crushing and rolling over everything in it’s path while the duo resumed their fighting. The tree trunk was rolling over to where Eric was, and the human found it the perfect excuse to finally use some of his magic.

He turned around to face another mob of Dusknoir's goons charging at him. He rose his left arm and opened his hand. “ _Flamma!_ ” He shouted inside his mind, the next instant a large flame quickly burst out and burned everything in front of him to a crisp, Eric swinging his sword to the fire… and the sword caught on fire, using both of his hands to swing the sword around him. He spun around as he sliced horizontally, then let go of his sword, grabbing it with his other hand and throwing a vertical slash from bottom to top, sending more Sableyes flying up. The log was almost on top of him, and the human decided to use this to his advantage. He snapped his finger as he repeated the spell. If anything, he really just pictured the log on fire and snapped his fingers, the log itself catching on fire as it rolled on top of him. Eric then turned around with all his might and kicked it away and towards Dusknoir, who was standing outside the battle with his arms crossed.

The log took it’s time to reach Dusknoir, but even when it did, the ghost type was already prepared for it. Without flinching, he punched right through the log, turning it into burning splinters. Whilst the remains of the flaming wood were still airborn in front of him, he crouched down and charged forward through the flames, getting to where Eric was standing in a mere second. He threw a brutal punch at Eric, who received the full blow to his chest and sent him flying away. He managed to turn himself around whilst being sent away by the knockback, and saw his other sword shining through their foes and ending their lives not too far away from him. He called it back, the blade disappearing in a flash of light and then reappering in his other hand just as he hit the face of the cliff with his feet, crouching down and jumping off of it again and towards Dusknoir. He was already waiting for him though, the huge mouth in his abdomen opening up, a large shadow ball flying out and towards Eric.

The human slashed at it before it hit him head-on, the explosion sending him tumbling away, his swords flying out of his hands and then disappearing in two simultaneous bursts of bright light. Just as he landed on the ground, sliding on his feet whilst grabbing the ground with his right fist, he summoned his bow with his left hand, then let go of the ground and kept himself moving by floating on the ground with the wind, then began firing off arrows against Dusknoir, doing large circles around him as he fired arrows from every possible angle. Even though his target was large, it wasn’t stationary, and the ghost type swayed to the sides and used one of his minions as at meat shield to avoid the human’s attacks.

Grovyle saw Dusknoir fighting, anger flaring up inside of him as he stopped what he was doing and charged into that circle of arrows, which made Eric have to stop firing, fearing he would hit his friend accidentally. Celebi shouted at Grovyle to stop, to not fall into temptation, but the grass type was already running at him, whilst she defended herself of some Sableye. One behind her readied a claw, but an arrow quickly pierced through it’s arm, rendering it useless, and then another one went through it’s neck and killed it, Celebi turning around to face Eric. The human smiled back and pointed behind her, preparing another arrow.

Grovyle howled out as he ran up to Dusknoir, throwing his fist back and then trying to punch Dusknoir. The ghost type responded by throwing a punch as well, their fists colliding mid way. They stood there, struggling against eachother. “Well… You’ve certainly gotten better as time went on Grovyle… not so much of a weakling as before!” Dusknoir shouted, using more strength to push the grass type back.

The green pokémon had to use both of his hands to not get pushed back by the bigger pokemon’s fist, but managed to crack a smile. “Well, what I can say… I was motivated to learn so I could kill you off!” He responded, using all his force to grab Dusknoir’s fist and pull to the left, swinging the ghost type that way and throwing him away, getting some distance between him and his nemesis. At the same time, he released leaves from his elbows, and Dusknoir crossed his arms in front of his face so as to not get hit directly. The leaves only scratched his arms, but the real pain came when Grovyle dashed in and punched Dusknoir square on the eye, making him flinch.

Grovyle followed up with a roundhouse kick, but Dusknoir was quick to react and grabbed his leg, then lifted the grass type over his head and smashed him on the ground behind him. As soon as the grass type realized he had been grabbed, he pulled out his whip and constricted the ghost type’s neck with it, tightening it’s grip around his neck as he went over his head. Dusknoir let go of his leg as he landed on the ground, howling in pain. However, he quickly pushed it away as he dashed against Dusknoir again whilst he coughed and tried to catch his breath, only to receive a drop kick straight to his chest, sending him further away.

Dusknoir managed to recover and glanced over at the Grovyle, who had a vine whip in his right hand leaves between the fingers of his left hand. The ghost type cracked his knuckles and chuckled, staring at his foe once more before they resumed their fighting

Celebi rose her hand over her head and turned around, then brought it down on the incoming Sableye, making them fall to their knees under the pressure her psychic powers were applying to her. As she fended off any attackers, Eric slowly made his way towards her, firing arrows and kicking anything that came close to him. He stomped on a Sableye’s chest, pinning it to the ground and fired an arrow straight through it’s heart, then kicked the body away as he let go of the string for a second to throw his arm behind him and launch a fireball at a couple of Sableye, burning them to a crisp.

“This is way harder than it should!” Eric exclaimed over the sounds of fighting. Celebi understood him and back up against him, their backs pressed together.

“Why do you say that? Getting tired?” She taunted, using her powers to lift and smash another dead tree, the trunk swinging around wildly.

“Kind of. But it’s not that. It’s their goddamn size! I can barely hit them with my swords and I have to be constantly looking down. My back is killing me!” He responded.

She responded with laughter. “Well now, what’s this? Weren’t you taunting me for being so tiny before?” She asked, using her powers to send Sableye flying up in the air. “Serve’s up!” She exclaimed, telling the human to finish the job for her. He gladly appliged, turning around and firing a couple of arrows over the legendary’s head, hitting all of their targets. He then glanced at Grovyle and Dusknoir, and saw how the duo were fiercely fighting eachother. Grovyle was much more agile than Dusknoir, jumping over his fists and kicking his face, falling to the ground and rolling away to safety, but what the ghost type lacked in speed, he more than made up in brawn, as a single punch sent Grovyle flying away.

Eric motioned his head towards this scene. “Hey, you might wanna go help him.” He said, Celebi looking the same way he was. She gasped in horror as she saw Grovyle struggling to get back up in his feet and flew up and towards him. Eric called her. “Hey! You’re just gonna leave me here with these chumps?!” He asked, a Sableye growling with a snarl on his face, his claws shining. Eric sighed and created an arrow, then dashed in, grabbed the Sableye’s neck and stuck the arrow in it’s stomach, throwing it away. “Alright… I better finish off the small fry, or else they’ll be taking all the glory.” He told himself, summoning both of his blades again, crouching down.

He closed his eyes and focused, wind gathering around him, his right blade and crossed in front of him, whilst his left hand, which he was holding upside down, was crossed behind him. Wind gathered and flowed around him, tiny twisters forming as the breeze turned into a strong gust, almost all of the remaining Sableye gathering around him. The human opened his eyes and roared out, then completely vanished from the spot as he moved faster than the eye could see. Something flashed across the battlefield, and the next instant the human was back where he began, he stood up, spun his swords around and then slashed the air, the blood on the blades flying away. At that precise instant, mortal cuts and wounds appeared on the Sableyes’ bodies, and their corpses fell to the ground the next moment. Eric sighed, panting heavily as he successfully killed off all the remaining Sableyes in one swift move.

Celebi came in just at the right time, creating a psychic barrier to parry a direct punch from Dusknoir, and Grovyle followed up by throwing leaves at his stomach, which lightly damaged him, his torso presenting numerous cuts and bathed in blood, most of which wasn’t his own, and then the grass type used a vine whip to grab him from his waist and swung him around. He then let go, hurling the ghost type towards Eric, the human smirking as he realized they hadn’t forgotten about him. Almost comically, the human reared his right fist so far back that he even lifted a leg off of the ground.

 

**(Stop the music)**

 

“See ya!” But before his fist could hit him, Dusknoir spun and prepared another punch, aiming it at Eric’s face. He wasn’t willing to take any chances, and ducked, rolling away, letting Dusknoir slide on the ground and look at them, more than ready to fight. So was the trio however, Celebi’s eyes glowing intensely, Grovyle holding leaves between all of his fingers and Eric resummoning his blades once more and pointing both of them at him. “Game over, you bastard. Looks like you’re gonna have to visit a poke center… in the afterlife.” Eric swore, expressing the feelings that he and his two companions had towards Dusknoir… except for that last one. They didn’t understand that part about a poke center.

Dusknoir just gave them a smile and visibly relaxed. The smile on his face was unsettling to say the least. A roar then filled the air, so loud that it almost blew their ears out, all three of the pokémon covering their ears in pain whilst Dusknoir resisted. All around the clearing, Sableye tried to sneak away in fear, no matter the state of their bodies. Were they either completely fine or maimed, they tried to run as fast as they could. Eric saw this behaviour, a shiver going down his spine, as if something bad was about to happen. Celebi, however, recognized that roar, and grabbed onto Grovyle’s arm whilst trembling like a leaf, Grovyle trying to keep his cool.

“He’s here… Oh Arceus we’re…” Celebi began stuttering, but was interrupted by another loud roar, then Dusknoir roared with laughter, opening his arm wide.

“Idiots! Your fighting gave my master enough time to join us! Now we shall truly end this story once and for all!” He shouted, laughing even harder. Eric guessed who the ghost type was talking about and fell into despair. He was exhausted, and even for him it would be impossible to take care of him at that very moment. Grovyle, however, only felt his anger reignite, specially after he realized who was about to walk out off the forest around them. The source of all their harm, pain and suffering… The cause for everything that had happened up to that point...

They heard another roar as the trees began to crumble down in front of them, a faint orange light coming from the darkness as a large blue leg crushed the last tree that separated the monster from their view. The legendary time pokemon, Dialga, emerged from the shadows. The legendary was a four legged creature, his body was completely blue, though some gray metallic portions covered parts of it's head, legs and it's chest, in the center of which was an orange diamond, various orange stripes coming out of it and flowing all over and through his body. The legendary pokemon's head looked like a dinosaur's, a fin like structure on it's back. It had two horns on top of it's head and another two fang like horns around his mouth. It had some kind of spines on the back of his neck, and he had really long claws, though his tail was short. Lastly, there was some kind of wing like structure on it's back, though Eric didn't know if it did something.

Not that it mattered however, because it was probably going to lose it soon… If they were going down right then and there, he was going to make sure that this thing lost something. The creature roared yet again, and stared at the trio with it's red eyes, it’s gaze piercing right through their bodies, it’s cold stare chilling them down to the bone. While Eric still tried to stand strong, failing miserably as his legs shook, Grovyle’s anger wasn’t enough to counter the pokémon’s intimidating presence, and Celebi started feeling light headed. Even for her, the power of the mighty pokemon was terrifying for her. She could control time to some extent… but this thing WAS time itself… and he wanted all three of them dead.

“No... No... We... This... this can't end like this... It can't... After all we’ve gone through…” She began stuttering as Grovyle fell to his knees, defeated.

“It’s over. We’re done for. Everything up to this point has been meaningless, it doesn’t matter anymore. All the sacrifices... All the hope... Nothing. It’s all over.” He muttered to himself, frustration coursing through him.

Eric looked at his friends as they fell into despair, and seeing their faces of hopelessness made something inside of him twist and churn inside of him. He felt exhaustion creeping up on him, but... If he had more energy... He looked at the cliff face behind them. It was really tall, but even then, if he could pull “that” off… then it wouldn’t be that much of a problem. He didn’t have any other tricks up his sleeve however. If this didn’t work, then the only thing they would be able to do was to fight to the death and at least make a dent into this thing… It was all or nothing, a real gamble." _It's time try my luck… I’ve got a problem, don’t I?_ " He thought to himself, forcing a smile to his lips, trying to put on his best confident act.

Dusknoir then spoke. “Well? Lost your hopes already? What do you have to say?” He asked.

Eric took a step forward, Dusknoir flinching… when all of a sudden he dismissed his swords and fell to his knees, faking tears and sobbing. coughing and wheezing. “Well... I guess we... were wrong after all…” He continued on coughing, Dusknoir smiling widely whilst his friends just looked at the human, really confused. “We were wrong all along, oh great Dusknoir and Mighty Dialga… We were so blind and thought we could change this world… but alas, we’ve been proven otherwise. Please, mercy!” Eric exclaimed, crouching down and appealing Dusknoir’s MASSIVE ego.

It worked really well, as the ghost type immediately fell into his trap. “Well… I am great and merciful… but I’m afraid you and your friends have wasted more than enough time on your foolish crusades, so…” Before he could finish talking, however, Eric rose his hands up.

“WAIT!” He shouted, interrupting Dusknoir. “If that’s the case, then I have a last request!” He said, as he put a hand inside the pocket of his jacket, then pulled out a transparent plastic bottle with a strange liquid inside of it. “One last drink, please… That’s all I ask of the great Dusknoir.” He said, giving him the pleading eyes.

Dusknoir thought about it for a second… but gave him his consent with a wide smile. “Very well then. Enjoy your last drink in this world, human, for the next one you have shall be in the depths of hell.” He said, Eric nodding and opening the bottle, chugging down some of the liquid. The bottle was halfway full when the human began drinking, and when he stopped it was missing a fourth of what it originally had. Once the human finished drinking, he let out a  loud sigh and closed the bottle, putting it back into his jacket once again. Energy coursed through his body again, but… he wanted Dusknoir to remember this one.

“Alright… now… my friends, come close to me…. let’s die together.” Eric said, spreading his arms. Grovyle and Celebi looked at him, unsure about what was going on, but the human glanced at them. “Come on… it’s useless. Let’s just accept this and die together.” He said, winking an eye at both of them. They nodded, feigning looks of sadness and walking up close to the human, who wrapped his arms around them.

“Now… let’s sing together…” As he held them together and stood up, he opened his mouth and the trio began floating above the ground.

“I believe I can flyyyy! I believe I can touch the sky!” Eric shouted out as he, Grovyle and Celebi flew up into the air, to the surprise of everyone but Dialga, who roared loudly.

“What the-?! Catch them!” Dusknoir shouted, pointing at them as the Sableye all over the area tried to jump up and reach them. However, they were too far away from the ground for them to reach. Grovyle was looking at the ground whilst grabbing Eric’s left arm with both of his hands, whilst Celebi laughed as they ascended, the human continuing to sing. Dusknoir got fed up and floated up to where they were, trying to punch them out of the air. However, Eric simply flew away faster, getting to the top of the cliff really quickly. He threw his friends on the ground once they were there and turned around, aiming an arrow at Dusknoir and firing. The ghost type barely had enough time to dodge it, and even then it hit his shoulder, which made him howl out in pain and fall back down to the ground below,

He roared out as he fell down, crashing against the ground and blowing all of his Sableye goons away. He slowly got up and looked up the cliff, only to see Eric sticking his tongue out. The human then turned around and looked at his friends, who were pretty surprised, specially Celebi.

“What... How... How did you... get us up here?!” She asked. Eric shook his head.

“I'll explain later, now we gotta get moving. That potion won't last forever” He said. Grovyle and Celebi were confused, but Eric was still right. They needed to get away from there on the double. Eric began running to the other side of the cliff, both of the pokemon right behind him. Eric was really worried. What he had just done... He would probably know…

Dusknoir was still looking up the cliff, even when dialga was gone. He was filled with anger. He had been fooled by that human... Once again... He gritted his teeth. He had called him an idiot... A cocky fucker... His eye widened in anger. “This will not stand! I will get my revenge on him! I will find him and…”

He was interrupted by a voice behind him. “And probably get fooled again.” Dusknoir turned around sharply. He recognized the one who was standing in the shadows.

“You... what do you want now?”

The shape standing between the trees smiled. “Nothing... I just want you to give up on them... and leave this to professionals…” The one in the darkness said. His dark purple eyes shone brightly in the shadows, and they sent chills up Dusknoir's spine, though he tried to keep his calm.

“What... Professionals? You mean that... you know him?” The pokemon asked. He then realized. “Of course... you are both…”

The one in the darkness interrupted him again. “You can take all the merit... but... I take his head. How about that?” That right there, was an offer Dusknoir couldn't let down. He smiled.

“Deal... But... how are you going to get rid of that human?” The dark type asked. He then saw his smile shining in the shadows, and he trembled. He had never seen such a smile... He knew he was on their side, but... He was still afraid of him. The figure in the shadows looked at the back of his right hand. The silhouette of a gray star was shining, with ten circles orbiting around it. Only the ones with a flame and a tornado were lit, red and light green respectively.

“Oh, believe me... I have my ways…"

* * *

“So... everything has to do with that weird symbol on the back of your hand?” Celebi asked. Eric nodded. They had found a cave to stay in to rest for a while. They had started talking about Eric's abilities.

“Yes... I am not going to explain how I got it... Because that's a really long story, but... This tattoo on the back of my right hand is the mark of the chosen one. This mark basically says that I was chosen from the ancients of light to banish darkness from my original world. Basically, I was a warrior. However... Shit got really fucked up and... I…” He sighed, as he remembered. “I don't really want to talk about it, so I'll get straight to the point.” He showed them the symbol.

“You see how all of them and grayed out except the fire and the tornado? Well, that's because only those essences are awoken.”

Grovyle looked at him, confused. “Essences?”

Eric nodded. “They are the entities that control all of the elements in a world. Basically, gods, so to say. There are twelve of them: Shadow, Fire, Water, Earth, Wind, Ice, Electricity, Space, Time, Light and Darkness. The last two are the strongest of the essences, as they decide the fate of the world itself. It can either be shone on by the purest of lights, or plunged into the depths of darkness itself. Light itself is the representation of pure energy, but said energy can not be brought into our material existance through conventional means, and darkness represents pure matter: shapeless and without any type of properties. Basically, a mountain of playdough, if you know what that is. Either way, the other ten are the ones that create the world, and all twelve have to exist for a world to be stable.”

“Stable?” Grovyle asked.”Yes. When I say stable is that all the powers and essences are balanced. There are rivalries between most, but the two that always bring trouble are light and darkness. They've always wanted to eliminate eachother, as they are complete opposites. However... they both have to exist in a world... and if one of them is completely eliminated then the world becomes unstable, as magic tries to fill the world, which ends up being completely destroyed. Both of the sides know this, and since nobody wanted their worlds to be destroyed, they didn't rise any conflicts for eons. But... Then he appeared.” Eric said, though he didn't continue. He looked at both of his pokemon friends.

“Clades appeared. He... was something that no one could've ever imagined... He wasn't anything. He was... nothing. No element, neither light or darkness... I don't know how to explain it... Though I can explain you his purpose... Destroy everything.”

Both of the pokemon, who were sitting on the ground in front of him, edged closer to him. “What?! Why?” She asked. Eric's face went grim.

“He's a being of the thirteenth essence... Nothing. You see... before the world were created there was absolutely nothing.”

Celebi stared at him, confused. “Nothing? You mean like a void of darkness?” The human shook his head.

“No... just... nothing. Even today, if you were to travel between worlds without enough precautions you would fall into the nothing. None of the worlds are connected directly, and those who know can open pathways between them, pathways which protect those who travel. Anyways... As I said, there was nothing. Then... something appeared. This something would be called in the legend as The Star. The Star created the first worlds. However, the nothing wanted what had been stolen from it. The Star didn't comply, and the nothing began destroying the worlds. The Star then divided itself into the twelve essences I've told you about before. The essences then fought against the nothing, and won the battle, as they managed to create enough worlds to hold it at bay.”

“However... The nothing managed to create his own warrior. Clades is this warrior. Clades objective is to infiltrate one of the sides, either light or darkness, and mess up the stability by provoking a conflict between the two. After that, he just watches the world burn.” He said, a sarcastic smirk on his face, though none of them understood. “He basically lets the worlds destroy themselves. He doesn't do it himself because he can't wake up the essences. And this is when we come back to where we started. The essences of a world are unaware of what happens, as they are insentient beings. To use weapons like my bow or my swords I need the essence let me use that power. For that, I need to call its attention by creating a huge amount of power, like a signal. I need fuel to do this, magic energy. Magic is flowing through my veins, so what better way to do so than getting the blood straight out of my body, the magic with it. This is how I acquire my powers.”

A question rose in Grovyle's head. “Wait... that means you have even more weapons?!" He asked. Eric nodded. “Yes. One for each essence except darkness and nothing. If I need to I will have to use them, but I don't really want to do that straight away. Each time I wake an essence. Any creature that has the same marking I do can use the same abilities. Clades, unfortunately, has another mark for some reason I have yet to discover. So, when I get a power, he does too, making him even more powerful. If I can limit myself to certain abilities, I can prevent him from getting too powerful. I do have a weapon that doesn't matter, and that is my staff. But... I somehow lost it when I came into this world. When I got here, my staff was gone, and I can't find it. I will have to look for it when we save the world.”

“Wait... Does that mean that our world is like this because of Clades?” Celebi asked, the realization finally dawning on her.

The human nodded.”Yes. All of this is Clades' fault. He somehow managed to completely stop time. Someone must've told him about the time gears... I have a suspect, but we'll get rid of him after we fix this mess. Celebi how close are we from the Time Passage?”

The legendary answered immediately. “We should be there after we get down from this mountain. From there, is smooth sailing through Dusk Forest. After that... both of you are on your own.” She said. Both of the guys looked at eachother. Eric smirked.

“If that's the case then this might be the last few hours we spend here.” He laid back on the ground. “Boy... can't wait to see the sun again…” He looked at Grovyle. “You're going to love it man. It's something amazing.” He smiled and looked at his friend, who, to his surprise, had a grim look on his face. Eric remembered what the pokemon had told him a few hours ago. The smile faded from his face, as he sighed. “Alright... let's just get some rest... And hope for the best.” He closed his eyes and tried to rest for a while. He didn't sleep though, he just had his eyes closed, his ears open and listening for anything that could enter the cave. After a few hours of resting, he was feeling fine, though he was still tired, probably the effects from the potion.

He did hear Grovyle moving around a lot in his sleep. However, he did hear Celebi's inconsistent breathing. “Celebi... Why are you still awake?” He whispered. The pokemon seemed to be surprised, as she gasped.

“Wha..? I thought you…” Eric opened his eyes and rose from the ground.

“Were sleeping? I don't usually sleep, only in safe places and after I've drunk a lot of the potion.” He explained, and Celebi seemed to remember something.

“Oh! Now I remember... I wanted to ask you what kind of potion that was, the one you took, and also why you hadn't told us about it.”

He frowned. “It's not what you think it is Celebi. You see, what I drank before is what I call a stamina potion, as it's actually pretty peculiar.” He said, and she nodded, focusing on what he was telling her.

“The potion that I drank before was a strange potion that seems to return stamina depending on the quantity one drinks. However, the effects only last for so long. It isn't a recovery potion, and it only gives the impression you have your energy back. Depending on how much you drink, the longer the effect lasts. When the effect wears off, exhaustion comes back. Because of the potion though, you become more exhausted than before. It basically serves as an extension to one's strength. However, if one was to drink way too much of the potion, the effect would last for way too long, and when the effects wore off, your body would be way too tired to function normally. You would instantly faint and if the dose was too high, you wouldn't have enough energy to drink, and would die from oxygen deprivation." He explained.

The pokemon gulped. "Sounds really dangerous... aren't you afraid of drinking too much and just dropping to the ground?" She asked. He shook his head however. “I've used it a lot of times, and I know how much I have to drink. It's still dangerous for anyone else though. I do remember someone who was an annoying mother fucker. He killed many innocents just to force me to give him the potion, so he could become as powerful as I was. He drank the whole thing."

He pulled the bottle out from his jacket. It wasn't a big bottle, maybe about 500ml. "Look at this thing. Full. In just one chug."

Celebi tiled her head. "What happened to him? "She asked.

"Oh, he became powerful alright. He was so powerful that he lasted for about ten hours of fighting. After that. The guy just dropped. No one missed him though.”

Celebi stared at him. The world they lived in didn't really leave any room for compassion or innocence, but death kind of still left a mark on it's inhabitants. Unless they were primal that is. Eric looked at her. "Now, can you now answer my question? And don't change the topic." He winks at eye at her, trying to make her feel more confident.

Celebi sighed. "I can't sleep. I have a... problem."

Eric rose an eyebrow. "What problem?"

She blushed."Eric... what do you know about love? And I mean the love that you feel... not the other one." Her embarrassment was clearly visible, but Eric smirked and rose a thumb.

"Gotcha. I know as much as everyone does. Nothing. Love is unpredictable, so I don't really know anything. You can ask me anyways, maybe I can say something not-stupid for once." He said. Celebi giggled.

"Alright... What would you do... If you loved someone that is... much different than you?"She asked. The human rose an eyebrow, and asked for clarification. "We aren't really that different either... we've known eachother for not too long and... I am someone really... important... but he... he won't live enough... I don't know what to do-"

Eric gave her a shit-eating grin. "Is it Grovyle?" He asked, interrupting her.

She looked at him, really shocked. "How did you..."

He shrugged. "Intuition” He simply lied, while in his mind he kept on swearing. “ _Damn it why does it always have to be so complicated? I swear... people fall in love and try to jeopardize everything… Heh… Look who’s talking”_ He snapped back to reality as Celebi coughed. "Alright... Yeah. You and him are pretty different, and you are scared he won't accept you because he won't live as long as you will..."

She nodded. "You read me like an open book.” She wasn’t exactly thrilled, but at least she had gotten it off of her chest, and now it was somehow Eric’s problem, who was racking his brains. In the end, he just went for the obvious and simple answer.

"Well... just tell him and wait for the result." She just stared at him, dumbfounded.

"What?!"She blurted out, and Eric shot a nervous glance at Grovyle, whose breathing was thankfully still consistent. He sighed in relief.

"Well... Both of you are never going to see eachother again if things go right. You only have one chance to do either: You can know if he loves you or not, or you can sit for the rest of your existence with that question lingering in your heart. Your choice." He stated, leaving it up to her. They didn't say anything after that. "Go rest some more. This will end soon... For better or worse." Celebi heard him mutter before she drifted off to sleep.

* * *

 

Two shadows were walking across a forest. The forest itself looked in bloom, but it was in black and white, just like the rest of that world. It was also covered in some kind of thick smog or mist. The tallest figure was the one in front, followed by another figure which floated in the air right behind him. "So... you are sure that they will come this way?" The floating one asked.

The taller one nodded. “Yes... This is the only way they can go back to the past... Unless he decides to awake the essence of time. If that's the case though... there won't be anywhere to hide from us.” He smiled after saying this, purple eyes gleaming in the dark.

* * *

 

"Is this really... your forest?" Eric asked. The forest itself looked... messed up, to say the least. Physically, there didn’t seem to be anything wrong with the forest, asides from the sepia colors that plagued the world already, and yet… each time he looked at it he couldn't help feel uneasy. When he ever got that feeling he was sure something was wrong in there.

Celebi looked at him. "What did you think? That everything was going to be alive? This pains me even more than it does you..." She looked at the trees she had watched grow, frozen in time, dead. "You must fix this... Please..." The legendary pleaded, a tear running down her cheek.

Grovyle placed his right hand on her shoulder and wiped the tear. "Don't worry... We'll do it... whatever the cost. "He said. She looked at him, smiling.

Eric walked forward. He inspected one of the trees closely. It looked like it was alive... And somehow, he could feel it was dead. No one knew what happened to the living things that were frozen in time. Some thought they would revive after time was resumed. Others though... Thought they were dead for good. If that was the case... More than half of the species of pokemon were gone forever. He placed his right hand on the dead tree... He then heard various high pitched screams. He quickly removed his hand from the log, panting heavily. "Fuck! "He looked at his friends, who had a worried look on their faces. "Grovs... you gotta check this out... This is... worrying." He said.

Grovyle walked up to his human friends and put a hand on the log, removing it from the tree. "Crap... What the hell was that... It felt like something was screeching inside my head… What was that?" He put a hand on his head. "My head is pounding... "He muttered. Celebi came up to them.

"I am the voice of the forest... and I know what my forest feels. Right now, I feel nauseated and sick... And I don't even need to touch the wood... I don't want to know what would happen if I put a hand on it..." She was slightly tempted to, but the human stopped her in her tracks, shaking his head. It just wasn’t the time for things like those.

"Come on, let's get this over with! "He shouted, waving his way. Both of the pokemon followed him, determined to jump to the next and final stage of their plan.

The forest looked empty while they walked inside. There weren’'t any pokemon running around or anything, and nothing could be heard either. They walked for a while, and they came up an opening, where multiple paths branched out. They looked around for a while, and both of the guys looked at Celebi. "Where to Celebi? "Eric asked.

Celebi looked around. "Left." She said. They went that way and came up to what looked like the exact same clearing. "Forward." She said. Grovyle was really confused, but Eric smiled to himself.

"A maze huh? You really took your precautions with this place celebi." He praised her dedication to keep this place safe.

She smiled at him as they came up to another opening. "Yes. Not everyone is allowed to make it to the Time Passage. If anyone could do so... Then we would certainly be in trouble. Right." She said.

They went the direction she said a few times. "Backwards." Both Eric and Grovyle looked at her, really confused.

"But... we just came from there. "The green pokemon said. The legendary looked at him. "Grovyle, just go that way. You'll be surprised." She said. The other one complied, going back the same way they came. Or so he thought. They didn't come up another clearing. They were in another path altogether!

"Wha... Where are we now?" He asked. Celebi smiled.

"We are really close to the time passage. Come on!" She exclaimed. All three of them began making their way to the center of the forest.

The deeper and closer the group got to the time passage, the more worried Grovyle got. "Celebi. Do you think that Dusknoir and his troops could get here? "He asked. She nodded.

"They could, yeah. But it would them so long to get through that maze that we would already be ahead of them by the time they got to us." She answered, smiling. Just then, they both noticed Eric, who was standing still, looking to their right.

"And... What are the chances of them just breaking through? "He asked. Celebi smiled.

"Impossible. They could never... "She looked the way he was looking. Her face went pale, and so did Grovyle's when they saw the trees that had been torn up and broken, making a path straight from the outside to the deepest part of the forest. "What the hell?! But... How?! You can't burn those trees, or break them! How did..." Eric felt a chill go up his spine.

"Whoever got here wasn't normal... Keep your eyes peeled guys. "He looked around. "I've got a really bad feeling about this..." He said. All three continued on their way deeper into the forest, Celebi now scared of anything that could appear. Grovyle was also paying attention around him, but he still couldn't keep his thoughts away from the female pokemon. He slowly tried to edge closer to her without the pokemon noticing it. Eric however notice them, and couldn't help but chuckled at Grovyle's attempt. He had one of his swords ready for anything that could jump on them.

They kept on walking for a few minutes until they came up to another open area, in the middle of which was a huge rock. He saw something glowing on the side of the rock which they could see from the entrance. It looked like the frame of a gate. "Is that... Is that seriously it? The time passage?”

Celebi rose an eyebrow. "Did you expect anything else? "She asked. He shook his head.

"No. In fact, I expected less. For being such a powerful thing, it's actually pretty obvious to what it is. Of course, it's already hard enough to get here... come on! It's like having a neon sign over it, with huge arrows pointing, screaming "TIME PASSAGE", you know?” Eric went into a rambling which made both of his friends stare at him, in a mix of confusion, amusement and general worry over their friend's sanity.

Yet again, he was the kind of guy to quite literally assault a prison by the front door, so they couldn't really discuss that theme with him. The answer was pretty obvious. Eric looked back at both of them. "What? "He asked, shrugging. "It's true. It's way too obvious." The legendary pokemon looked at him, a bit annoyed.

"Alright, then what do you suggest I do? Oh right, I can't do nothing about it. It's a time rift which for some reason appeared on this rock with this shape way too long ago, even before I can travel back to. I know how to travel in time, but this stuff is just way too out of my league." She said. Both of the remaining members of the group stood silent. Grovyle didn't know what the hell they were talking about, and Eric seemed to not know either.

"I... "He suddenly stopped talking mid-sentence. He looked around for a while, smiling after a few seconds. "I am not too swift with time travel myself. I can travel in time, but it's only in a few specific instances."

Grovyle and Celebi stared at him, really confused. "But didn't you say yesterday that you could travel in time too?" The grass type asked. Eric looked around nervously.

"Anyways. Celebi it's about time you open this thing right? "He said, changing the topic of the conversation. Both of his friends wanted to ask him, but they knew they wouldn't get any information from him.

"Alright... I'll open it, give me a minute." Celebi sighed in defeat. The legendary turned to the gate of light and placed her hands on it. She began concentrating on opening the way to the past.

Meanwhile, Eric and Grovyle were going over their plan of action one last time before they were there. Eric put his hand inside of the secret pocket of his jacket, pulling out a map. It wasn't any ordinary map though. It was what they called a "Wonder Map". Wonder Maps were kind of special. The wonder maps were something that "Exploration Teams" owned. From what Eric had been told, Exploration Teams were daily heroes. Their jobs consisted of helping those in need when they were in trouble. However, after the temporal freeze, all trace of these exploration teams had disappeared. The maps were owned by these teams, and each time the team explored a new location, it was immediately registered on the map. This helped the teams orientate themselves and indicate them where they had been to and where they hadn't been.

However these maps only showed these locations to the teams that originally owned the maps. This meant that when many of the maps were recovered, most of them were blank. However, something really weird happened, and it was related to Eric. When they were looking through some maps which everyone thought were blank, Eric somehow saw one of them printed. No one knows which team owned the map, or why the hell a human who had come from an entire world altogether could read a specific map. They had ignored that fact anyways, and focused on the fact that they finally had a map. The human had written the map down so everyone could see it. Afterwards, others had also written the map, but they kept the first copy.

"Ok... so after we land here after we travel back in time, we go west, to Fogbound Lake. We pick up the time gear there and then make our way to the east part of region, past the mountains." He pointed at the map, his finger tracing the way they were going to go. "We go south and pick up the one here…” He pointed at the south part of the region, were a peninsula stuck out." Then we go north and we grab the one in this forest..." He pointed at a forest which the map said was called "Treeshroud Forest". "And then the one inside the crystal Caves and then finally in the desert. After that we need to find a way to the Hidden Land and then fix time once and for all." Eric explained.

Grovyle was focusing on the map, but he couldn't keep his thoughts away from Celebi. This meant he would never see her again. Eric looked up at the legendary. "Remember, we have to go back about twenty years back in time, that way, we'll have more than enough time." He remembered her. She looked at him and nodded. She was focusing really hard on the Passage, but her thoughts were slowly deviating to the grass type pokemon that was sitting next to the human. She would never see him again... Should she try? It was risky but... it was worth it if... if he liked her back... She kept focusing on the time rift. It was almost ready for them anyways. She finished opening the portal and flew backwards, admiring her work as it came to life.

It suddenly faded, though it began to shine even brighter. Lines appeared from the bottom of the arc, as they traced across the ground. Thin gates of light started forming on the lines, making some kind of path into the rock. A pure white crack appeared on the area of the rock that was surrounded by the light. That area then exploded, the shards floating everywhere, but just stopping in mid air, floating, a white aura surrounding the shards. The place where the stone had been had been replaced by some kind of white vortex. Eric walked up the the path and whistled. "Wow... "He muttered.

Celebi looked back at him. "What did you say about being too obvious? "She said.

"Now this... this just needs a bigger neon sign. "He said, smirking. She groaned in annoyance, and Grovyle walked up to them and looked at the passage.

"So this is what's sending us to the past? " Celebi looked at him with sadness.

"Yeah... This is... going to take you to the past... " Eric noticed her sad tone. He looked at his pal, who also had a grim look on his face, and the human decided to try and come up with an excuse, and smiled to himself as he got an idea.

He looked around. "Hey... you guys heard that?” Both of them mimicked him, but answered negatively. The human summoned his words, then started walking away. "I think it may be those who broke into the forest... I'll go check it out."

He said, instantly running off into the forest. "Eric! Wait! I'll go with you! "Grovyle shouted.

They heard his voice from far away. "No! Stay there! And if something happens, scream! You scream loudly! Now go get them, tigger!” He cheered on from the distance.

Grovyle blushed. "What?! Eric! Eric!" Celebi giggled at his reaction. He looked at her, blushing even deeper. "Heh... He... he can be an idiot sometimes..." The pokemon said. She giggled again.

"Why not say always?" They could've sworn they heard someone groaning, but they ignored it. They stayed silent for a few seconds.

"Well... I think this is... the goodbye then... "He said nervously. She nodded.

"Yeah..." An awkward silence rose between them. "You know... I've been thinking..." She began. She sighed deeply. " _Should I..?_ " She thought, and immediately, Eric’s words echoed in her mind.

"Do you have your eye on anyone special?" She asked, stuttering between every word. He looked at her, a bit shocked.

"Well... I... Yes, yes I... I do. "He answered. Her eyes widened, and for a second she lost faith… but then she decided to push onward. "Oh, you do? Well... who's the lucky gal?" She interrogated further.

He looked around, really nervous. " _Eric... where the hell are you?_ " He was getting really anxious. "I... I... It's... it's... uh... "Grovyle looked at her. He then looked at the time passage. He closed his eyes and sighed. He muttered something which Celebi couldn't understand.

"What? "She asked.

He looked at her, straight into her eyes, and took a deep breath. "It's you. I... like you Celebi. I started feeling something for you while we were staying in the resistance's base. Though... you will never love me, I know it, we’re too… different.” Celebi stared at him, dumbfounded. Tears appeared on her face. "I know... I am an idiot for even feeling something for a legendary. You will live almost forever and I’ll just… I’ll weigh you down, really, I-”

Celebi silenced him with a kiss, their lips sealing together. Grovyle's eyes widened as she kissed him furiously. He ended up melting into the kiss, hugging her and kissing back. They kept at it for a few seconds before breaking away. "Did you seriously think it would matter to me? I like you... no, I love you Grovyle." His eyes widened, and kissed her again.

They melted into eachother's embrace, and were panting heavily after they broke apart again to breathe. "I love you too Celebi." He said. They heard something approaching them, and once they turned to face that direction, they saw Eric clapping, slowly approaching them, a smirk on his face.

"About time. I don't know how you guys couldn't figure out that you loved eachother earlier. Like… come on, put two and two together, or are you really that oblivious." Both of the pokemon stared at him as he kept talking sarcastically.

"So you knew?!" They said simultaneously. They then understood why he left. They couldn't help feel angry at him, but he has still helped them. Though the question was still in order. "Why didn't you tell us?! "Grovyle asked.

The human smiled again, shrugging. "The whole situation was just kind of unbelievable, really. Seriously, something out from a bad romance movie. There are so many obvious signs which you both dismissed as “Oh, I am miss-interpreting things”, the sheer fact that you’ve both spent so much time together that it’s just bound to happe… and the quite hilarious fact you both talked with the one friend you had in common about the exact same thing, expect on reverse. Just… wow. Textbook.” He clapped sarcastically.

Grovyle and Celebi were glaring daggers at him, still close together and hugging. The smirk disappeared from his face. "However, I think you were the ones that had to figure it out, and you did, so everything worked out in the end. I do want to give you guys my congratulations."

Both of the lovers face’s soothened. "Thanks man…” Grovyle said sincerely, and Eric smiled. "Hey, we're friends right? Anyways... now you know what happens, right?" He told both of them. Their faces went grim, and the human winced. "Yeah... Well... so much for romance…” Both of the pokémon looked at eachother, ignoring Eric.

“I'll be waiting for you Grovyle... Even if something happens... I will find you my love... I'll be there with you for as long as I can." She whispered, tears on her face. He was also crying. "I will miss you Celebi... "He said. They kissed again. They both looked at Eric, whose faces didn't show any clear emotion, though he had a faint smile on his face. "You sure you want to leave pal? I can do this by myself you know. It won't be too hard. "He said. Grovyle shook his head. “After all of what we've been together and then I chicken out in the end? No. "He looked at her, who smiled. "Go get them sweetie. "He blushed hard, flinching. "Sweetie?! "He shouted. Eric laughed while Celebi giggled at the pokemon's reaction.

Eric approached the duo. "Well then, I guess it's time I say goodbye to you Celebi. "He said, looking at the legendary. She smirked. "Yep... It's been a pleasure having you around, world traveler. "She said. He smiled at her. "I will come back some other time you know, so this isn't really a goodbye. "The human said. He looked at the time passage. "Twenty years... Alright then... Let's do this. "Eric ran in, dashing under the arcs of light and jumping into the vortex. Grovyle looked at Celebi one last time and waved off, before running after Eric and traveling back in time.

_I owe you both so much… your kindness… your faith… your friendship… And I don’t think I’ll ever get to repay either of you. If only I could guarantee that your love would transcend this dark age… I would do all in my power to guarantee that at least you two have a better life. Grovyle… Celebi… Thank you._

* * *

 

Eric and Grovyle were both sliding down what looked like cyclone that was sucking them. To the green creature this was a new experience, though for the world traveling human, it kind of fell like a slide for him. Through the pokemon was lying on his back while he slid down, Eric was standing on his feet, like he was skiing. He howled out in enjoyment, as he felt like they were going at an incredible speed. He had traveled back in time before, not only using his powers, but also other ways that other worlds had provided him. This was by far the most fun one.

The fun didn't last long however, as the cyclone suddenly disappeared. Eric and Grovyle began sliding across the ground, which they couldn't see,a s it was completely black. They were literally standing on nothing. Eric managed to stop himself while Grovyle moved further away. He finally got up and looked at his partner. "What the hell happened?" He asked. Eric looked around.

"This isn't the past... Something's fishy here..." He muttered. They heard a voice laugh in the distance. "Oh great... now the villain that stopped the time will reveal himself and give us a monologue of how we are meddling with him..." Eric mocked them, made his bow appear and tensed an arrow, ready for the jerkface to appear from the blackness.

He heard his laughter stop. "Now... Let's not be too hasty Eric. I have just come to talk." The voice said.

Eric humphed. "Yeah? Well my arrow wants to tell your face something. Don't make me wait." Eric mocked. The voice chuckled. He heard something behind him. He spun around immediately and shot an arrow, but realized that there was nothing that way, the arrow completely missing. He heard the same sound behind him again, and he turned around, this time without an arrow on his bow. He saw the pokemon that had been taunting them, and had probably told Clades about the Time Gears: Darkrai.

"There... now we can talk. I am afraid you already know who I am right?" He asked. Darkrai was often referred to as the nightmare pokemon, and his shape couldn't match even better to such description. He had a small head, with some kind of fog-like plume that waved like it was a ghost, covering his right eye. The only eyes that Eric could see was bright blue. There was a red spiky growth around his neck. He had really skinny arms and legs, with long black tatters coming out his shoulders and black claw like hands.

Eric smirked. "Yeah. The cliche villain that conquers the world because he feels like it, and now wants to tell us about how great he is and stuff. "This seemed to amuse Darkrai instead of anger him however, as he laughed.

"Well... seems like he was right after all, you are more of a fool than I thought, as well as arrogant and downright insulting." The dark type said.

The human smirked. "Coming from you? Come on, why'd you do it Darkrai? How did he convince you? Power? The whole world for yourself? The only thing he wants to do is destroy everything, including yourself! "The human shouted.

The nightmare pokemon smirked. "Do you think I'm an idiot?"

Eric's eyes widened. "Yes! You read my mind! Are you also psychic type or something?"Eric mocked, yet again. This one seemed to annoy him.

"You will not confuse with your words! I was promised the whole world covered in darkness, and I got what I wanted eventually! You can see it with your own eyes fool! Now you are the ones that stand in my way! I will destroy you! Both of you!" He shouted, anger in his eyes.

Eric leaned to Grovyle. "Someone woke up and stubbed their toe against the bed this morning..."He said, smirking. The green pokemon stared at him.

"You are seriously joking in a time like this?!" He shouted, amazed at his partner's ability to make someone angry. Darkrai was about to charge at them, when another voice was heard, this one more deep and serene. 

"You fall to his mockery Darkrai... you are truly an idiot." The voice said. Eric recognized the voice instantly.

"Clades! Show yourself you fucker!" Eric shouted. He made both of his swords appear. He looked around. Clades had to be somewhere around there. Grovyle was also looking around, but also keeping an eye on the nightmare pokemon. He saw some movement suddenly rising into the air in his direction, quickly descending to where they were. He looked at Eric.

"Watch out!"He shouted. Eric looked up at put both of his swords on top of his head, just in time to block another pair of swords. These ones were normal straight swords, which seemed to be a bit transparent.

He pushed upwards, launching his attacker upwards. He began spinning around in the air, as Eric shot arrows at him, the projectiles barely missing him. The other one landed on his feet and looked at Eric, his purple eyes shining brightly somehow. "So... about time you appeared, Clades."Eric said, regaining his composure. He looked at Clades. He was a human, just like him, maybe a bit short than he was, but not too much. His hair was gray, his eyes, as stated before, were purple. He was wearing a cape that left a trail of shadows behind, which looked like mist. The cape covered all of his back and sides, though Eric couldn't distinct his clothes. The trail of mist covered his legs, making Eric unable to see either his legs or feet.

 

([Disappeared – Kingdom Hearts HD](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ANf3umZZqpU))

 

Clades rose his right arm, pointing at Eric with the tip of the sword. "I think you and I have something to sort out Eric." Eric smiled, tensing up.

"Yeah, you're right..." He rose his swords. "We have something to settle... "A wicked smile appeared on Clades' face, and Eric's faded out. He moved his feet and started walking towards his foe. The other took the initiative, and charged into Eric. Their swords clashed as they jumped away from eachother. Eric began running around Clades as he kept his eyes on him. He threw his left sword at the other human, but he merely ducked under it, the hurling blade missing completely. Right after throwing the spinning blade Eric had jumped into him, raising his sword over him, but it met with one of Clades´blades. The other one was about to strike Eric, but the human threw a gust of wind from his hand, blowing him away.

Clades heard the sword spinning behind him, and crouched in time to dodge it. Eric was already in front of him though, as he jumped in their, grabbing the sword while spinning and plummeting down on Clades with both of his swords together. The purple eyes human blocked them, the impact however making him flinch. “You're hitting hard this time around Eric..." He heard the human panting. "Let's see how long that lasts!" He pushed his enemy backwards into the air, while he spun around. He dismissed his swords and used his bow. He tensed up an arrow and waited for his body to be aiming right at Clades. Time seemed to slow down as his arrow lined up with his face. Eric smiled as he let the arrow go. The other one deflected the projectile with his sword, and saw Eric out of the corner of his eye preparing more.

He turned to him as the human began shooting arrows at a tremendous speed, all of them headed straight for Clades' body. He started spinning his swords around, slashing the arrows out of the air while walking towards Eric, as the other walked closer to him, each time getting closer and closer. When they were close enough, Clades threw a slash with his left sword, but Eric dodged to the right and tried to stab Clades neck with an arrow. The other however, spun around, his swords almost slashing Eric in half. He jumped backwards and prepared to use an fire imbued arrow. Clades was faster than him however, as he dismissed his swords. He made a circle in the air around the area Eric was, and then snapped his fingers. The area around Eric suddenly burst into flames, trapping him in a ring of fire.

Arrows began flying through the walls of fire as temperature rose quickly. Eric noticed that they were coming counterclockwise. He calculated how much time each arrow took to be thrown, and how far away they were from eachother and the speed they were being thrown at. He aimed one of his arrows and pointed straight to where he thought Clades was. The projectile was a hit, as he heard him growl. The wall of fire died down to reveal Eric's foe with a crossbow, aiming straight at him. The hero had barely enough time to roll out of the way of the arrow as it swizzled right next to him. Clades charged another bolt and shot. Eric shot an arrow, clashing with the bolt in midair, both projectiles bouncing off and falling to the ground. Eric's arm proved to be faster than Clades', as he had been hit by the arrow from before. Eric shot an arrow at his chest. He saw it coming and moved out of the way, but it ended up hitting his shoulder.

Just then, he heard Grovyle call him. "Eric! Need a little help over here!" He shouted. Eric turned that way to look at him. He saw both Darkrai and him fighting. Eric used his bow and aimed for Darkrai. The legendary looked at him before his legs somehow retracted into his body and began flying around at a high speed, making it almost impossible for Eric to hit him. His movements were erratic and all around impossible to predict. He didn't attack them though. He noticed how, in fact, each second that passed he got further away into the blackness of the the time passage…

 

( **Stop the music** )

 

Now Eric understood. They weren't fighting them. Clades and Darkrai just wanted them to lose time! They were now stuck inside of the time passage, which meant that the more time that passed, the less time they would have to save the world! "Grovyle! Ignore them we need to go!" Eric shouted. Grovyle looked at him.

"But how?!" He asked. Eric pulled out the watch from his jacket.

Clades was looking at Eric, breaking the arrow from his shoulder. "A pocket watch? What are you going to do with that?"

Eric looked at him, smiling. "Well... I found this while I was exploring down in the mines. Back at the resistance's secret base. I didn't know what it was... Until I found out that it is capable of controlling time itself... And I don't even need to wake up the essence." Eric’s smile grew wider, while Clades stared in disblief?

"Impossible… what could such an item be doing in a world like this?! "He asked. Eric rose the watch. "Beats me… But either way, it’s going to help us  out!” He shouted. He clicked a button on the side, and the watch lid opened. Suddenly, what looked like the hands of a clock appeared on midair. They were made out of pure light. They started spinning around, the minute hand going faster than the hours. Both of them froze when pointing upwards, at twelve-o-clock. A circle formed around the hands, and it flew away into the darkness, away from everyone. There, the circle was filled with light, and another vortex appeared. Eric looked at Grovyle. "Run for it! Go!”

Both of them ran to the vortex, covering a lot of ground really fast. "No! "Clades shouted. He seemed to completely rise from the ground and fly straight for them. Eric didn't notice him, as Clades got right behind him. He grabbed his right hand, making him fully stop. This confused Eric a lot, before he started feeling an intense pain come from the hand. He felt all of his power being sucked away in a moment. Eric punched him right on the face with his left hand, making him let go. However the harm was already done. The pain didn't subside, and Eric kicked Clades and launched him backwards, though he did see a wicked smirk on his face. Eric looked at his hand, and watched, in both awe and horror as the tattoo at the back of his hand started disappearing slowly.

Each circle began to slowly fade, leaving Eric with a strange empty feeling. He looked at his foe. "What the fuck did you do?! "He asked, now really scared. He had never dreamed that could happen. He then saw how a white and black ball surged from his hand. He instantly knew what it was. " **No**! Not them!"

He shotued. Clades rose from the ground. "Yes! Yes! "He rushed to Eric, a crazy smile on his face. " **Give me your power, Eric!** ”

Eric then made a decision. He knew what he had right in front of him. An immense amount of power. What he had on his left hand, was an artifact with an unknown amount of power that he had found in that world. Was it chance… or was it fate? The circumstances were strange, almost as if it all had to be this way... He didn't think twice.

Time slowed down for everyone, as Eric threw the watch at the ball. Both of them collided together, sparks of pure energy surging all over the place. A screeching noise was heard, that made their ears hurt. Everything around them shook violently, as the darkness itself began crumbling apart, white cracks appearing. The ball seemed to become gray... Before exploding. A wave power flowed everywhere, as they all felt something disappear, not only from them, but form around them. Eric saw the pieces of the clock flying around in different colors. He saw ten of them, glowing in strange colors before completely disappearing.

Clades, who was really close to him grabbed Eric and placed his right hand right on Eric's chest.

He felt something surge from it and into his body, as he screamed in pain. He only saw something green move swiftly before he felt the grip on his neck soften. Something grabbed his arms and pulled him away from the darkness... and into light. His vision was fading, though he knew he had been rescued by Grovyle's Vine Whip. He then felt like he didn't touch anything with his feet... or arms... Nothing. They were falling in some light. Eric looked at Grovyle. Who was calling out his name, though Eric could only read his lips, the pain in his chest way too much for him to handle. He saw him say, "Give me your hand!". Eric complied and met up with his.

Suddenly, some powerful force seemed to pull from the human and the pokemon from different directions, as even holding eahcother's hands was painful. He saw his green friend say something again, though he couldn't made it out. His vision was too blurry. He knew he wasn't going to make it, and all things considered, he was only going to be a drag. He put his free hand inside of his jacket, and slowly pulled out an old piece of paper. He couldn't hear his own words, though he was sure he said this:

"Find the time gears. Save the world... pal... "And with that, he let go. He heard Grovyle's scream as he was pulled away. He closed his eyes, though he could still see the light through the skin. It was because of this, that he knew when the light died.

* * *

It was a dark and stormy night, and the town was being hit by a violent storm. The trees were about to be blown off, let alone the bushes. However, one of these bushes didn't fly off. It was the one located on top of a bluff. Under the bush, there were some stairs, which led to a cave on the side of the rock. There, one could see a bed, and on top of it, someone was trying to sleep. Another lightning struck, and the creature jumped up from the bed. It hated lightning. It was scary. Another one struck, and wind seemed to get stronger, as the creature curled up on it's bed, shaking like a leave. It opened it's eyes, clear and blue and the sky, though not at that moment. And then, the creature saw it. Outlines by yet another lightning bolt, it saw something plummeting down to the water, right in front of the opening. She closed it's eyes, really scared and what or who, could've fallen down.

He was falling really fast. He couldn't hear anything, and he felt really weak. But he could feel cold around him, and the wind around him getting faster and faster. He was free falling, with no way of stopping him. His powers were most likely done. He was done for. After what seemed like hours of falling and pain, he hit something hard. Something really hard, that then turned soft, and swallowed him. It was really cold. He began sinking in a liquid, that he didn't know what it was. He opened his eyes, and screamed at the temperature. He opened his eyes, though he could only see blackness. He had to close them again though, as they began to scorch, like something was burning them. The pain in his chest was unbearable, and he had to breathe. He opened his mouth in desperation, trying to breath in air... But the only thing that came into his mouth was a salty liquid, which almost made him puke.

The liquid flowed into his body, filling his lungs and stomach. He opened his eyes again. He started feeling numb, his mind slipping away. He saw something sparkle up in the sky, before his whole world slowly turned black. Without being able to breath, the pain and oppression in his chest, and the scorching in his eyes, he felt himself slowly drifting into sleep. And then, when the world was completely black, he stopped feeling everything, and gave in to an eternal sleep…

* * *

 

**_You are offering me... A second chance... A rebirth... But... why?_ **

**_I don't have any choice._ **

**_But... how can I trust you?_ **

**_You can't, but what awaits you if you don’t is nothing but a life of misery and fear. I offer you redemption. Do you accept?_ **

…

…

**_I accept._ **


	2. Chapter 1 - Rude Awakening

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An old warrior snuffed out. A new hero raises to take his torch.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone, and welcome back again to A Hero's Rebirth. I'm going to be actually surprised if someone comes back after the last chapter... I guess I'll just have to get used to having low numbers again I guess, though I hope someone actually enjoyed the chapter (shoutout to whoever left kudos, you're the best).
> 
> As an interesting detail (I use the term "interesting" lightly, I know) English isn't actually my first language. I'm Spanish, and back when I first wrote this I was still studying English, hence why you'll see some small typos, though I've been working to fix as many as I could find.
> 
> That being said, I hope you do enjoy!

 

**Chapter 1**

**–**

**Rude Awakening**

 

_“You don't understand... Her destiny isn't pure! We must end this! For the good of our lord!” She heard him say... His voice still prevailed in her dreams... even after all that time…_

_“Elly! Run!” She was on top of a pink pokemon, which was running really fast. Behind them, in the darkness, she heard a shout._

_“SKYEEE!”_

_She came back to that place she once called home... And she found her there._

_“MOOOOOOM!” A pair of red eyes flashed in front of her, before she screamed louder._

* * *

 

She woke up abruptly, a cold sweat over her brown fur. Her crystal blue eyes were wide open, as she was terrified from the nightmare. She didn't know what was better. Staying up through a storm like the one last night... Or falling asleep to have those nightmares... She blinked a few times before she stood up on her four legs, stretching. After yawning again she looked around the cave that she called home for almost ten years. It was on the side of the Sharpedo Bluff, which was called like this because the opening on one of the sides resembled the shape of Sharpedo's face.

This opening was a cave, which is where she lived. It was a small cave, though big enough for two pokemon to live in. There was a tiny water spring, surging from the stone walls, which filled a small pond, where water stayed in. She slowly walked up to it, stumbling around, still half asleep. She leaned over it, put her paws together, picking up some water and washing her furry face. The water dropped back to the pond. After the waves cleared away, her face appeared as a reflection on the water. She was brown furred eevee, with crystal blue eyes. Though most of her fur was brown, a part of it on her neck was a creamy color, as well as in the end of her tail. Her name... she didn't want to remember. She liked her name, since it was given to her by the only person that had truly loved her: her mother. However, it brought back horrible memories, and throughout the years she had learned to keep them out of her head.

She also didn't want... him, to find her. Because of this, she told everyone her name was Eevee. Still, nightmares like the one she had just experienced came back to her once a few weeks. She walked over to the bag lying next to her bed. She opened it and grabbed a pendant inside of it. It was a piece of stone, which had been perforated and had a string, so as to be able to hang it from her neck. She put it on and grabbed the bag. She walked over to some stairs which lead up and started rising. A few steps and she pushed out a bush which was blocking the entrance which lead to the surface. Once out, she put the bush back on the hole, camouflaging the entrance. She looked up to the sky. The sun was high, probably mid day. She sighed deeply and looked in front of her. Not too far away, she could see a town. She began walking towards it, towards Treasure Town.

* * *

 

He slowly came back to consciousness... He slowly started feeling something cold washing around his head... He could smell something, but he couldn't quite put a finger on what it was. He tried to move his arms and legs, but they only twitched slightly, responding to brain's impulses. His head hurt like hell, and there was a ringing noise that didn't let him hear anything. It seemed to come from inside of his brain, and he couldn't think straight. He groaned... Big mistake, as the sound seemed to echo inside of his head, like there were a pair of drums in his head. He tried to open his eyes, which he eventually managed to do, only to find the sun shining straight into his eyes, blinding him. The ringing noise started fading, and he could hear the soothing sound of the waves that were crashing against the rocks. He moved his head to look up.

He found himself staring into the large blue sea. He was probably lying on a beach. Another wave crashed on the sand, making the water arrive to his forehead, almost getting in his eyes. He tried to move his arms and legs again, to try and get away from the water. He could end up being washed up by the water if he blacked out again. He got on his belly, his eyes half open, half closed, his consciousness slowly slipping away again. He looked in front of him and began moving away from the water, dragging across the warm sand. He could feel the small grains rub against his…

Fur?

For a second, the thought was strange to him... What was he? Where was he? Who was he? He didn't remember... But he did sure as hell feel sleepy. He moved a few more inches before he blacked out on the sand again, the sun still shining high up in the air. Once he closed his eyes however, he did hear... a voice. It said... "Eric", and an image of a two legged creature wearing strange clothes appeared in the darkness, before it slowly faded. And with it, his consciousness.

* * *

  


([Pokémon Mystery Dungeon – Treasure Town Remix](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-vE9fCHkcE))

 

Treasure Town was a town located to the west of the region. It didn't hold as many inhabitants as the bigger cities, but there were many species of pokemon that passed through that town daily. Because of this, businesses were usually filled, and they prospered really well. Eevee walked inside of town, just to be met by the usual pokemon filled main street, were the most visited shops were. She walked by between the many creatures going about their usual routine. Buying, selling and exchanging goods. Her routine was fairly simple.

After mid day she headed over to the Kecleon Market, where both of the Kecleon markets sold their goods for explorers and the likes. Both of them noticed her as she came up to the stand.

“Good morning Eevee!” They both said at the same time. She smiled.

“Good morning!” She answered. She walked around and went into the shop. One of the Kecleon brothers, the purple one, came in right after her. Kecleons resembled chameleons in both form and abilities. Their bodies were usually green, with a red zigzag line going across their belly, with some yellow lines outlining their ears, eyes and their mouths. The one that came into the tent however, was purple, which was a really weird variant, which wasn't seen very often. For Eevee though, he was more than normal, since she saw him almost every day.

Eevee decided to strike a conversation before him. “I see the business is coming up nicely as usual.” She said.

The chameleon nodded.” Yeah. It's a really busy day. I hope you are wide awake, because we have a lot of clients today. Don't doze off today Eevee!” He said. She nodded, smiling.

“When have I dozed off while at work?” She asked. Kecleon stared intensely at her, as he brought his hand up. He started raising his fingers one by one. She sighed. “Alright alright... I won't screw this up…” She said. He nodded.

“Alright then... Now let's do it!” He shouted before heading back outside, Eevee right after him.

She loved that job, just because of the fact that she sold things to Exploration Team Members. The Kecleon Market was a shop which sold unique items to the teams so as to help them in their missions. She liked the fact that she more or less helped exploration teams, but for her, the best part was that, sometimes, some of the members would stay around and would tell her their adventures. And these would fuel her dreams of becoming a famous explorer. She kept on working, hoping of someone to just tell her their adventures. No one did however.

 

( **Stop the music** )

 

She finally finished her turn about four hours later. It was almost five o'clock by then, and the shops were already closing. She sighed in disappointment as she went back into the shop. The green Kecleon gave her the share of the day: 700 poke, a few apples and berries. He noticed she looked sad. “Eevee, is there something wrong?” He asked her. She shook her head. “Nah... It's ok... It's just…”

Kecleon read her face like an open book, guessing what was going on.”No stories today I guess.” She took her time to nod, a sad expression in her eyes.. “Eevee... why don't you go to the guild and try to join? You'll get a home, a good job and you will finally fulfill your dream of becoming an explorer!” He suggested her.

She shook her head. “No, I... I can't…”

He stared at her confused. “Why?” She didn't answer however. He sighed. “Alright then... see you tomorrow Eevee…” He wished her a good night. She nodded and walked out of the shop. The purple Kecleon waved her off on her way out. She didn't look at him however, she looked really depressed. Though she wasn't part of their family, both brothers were worried about her. The green one came out with his brother.

“She's a good girl... She isn't truly happy, yet she looks cheerful and helps a lot.” The green Kecleon said. His brother looked at him. “She deserves something else... I just hope she finds someone special... Or else I don't think she'll keep going like this.” He continued, worry in his voice.

Eevee walked away to the way her ‘house’ was. However, when she was halfway there, she stopped. She was thinking about what the green Kecleon brother had told her. Should she really try? She didn't have anything else to do, and didn't have anything to lose really... She looked at her pendant. Directly at her stone relic. She looked at it and smiled. She rushed to her cave, once there, she removed the bush, she went inside and left the bag in there. She came back out running, remembering to put the bush back in it's place and began running through town. Both of the kecleon brothers saw her, and she could see the smiles on their faces.

_"This is it!" She thought. "Today, I am joining the explorer's guild!"_

* * *

 

Wigglytuff's Guild was pretty unique. It was located to the east of town, going up the stairs in the crossroad. It was a strange tent atop the hill, which had the shape of a Wigglytuff's head. There was a path which lead up to a strange wooden grate in the ground, which covered a hole. There sticks on top which there were wooden heads of pokemon. She could recognize some of them as famous explorers who had trained there, and had succeeded in becoming some of the best. However, alone all of these things sounded cool, the combination really didn't build much confidence in her. She didn't know what the grate on the floor was for, and sometimes in her dreams she would dream that it opened and she fell down into an endless black hole. She always woke up after a few seconds, but any of this didn't help at all when it came to giving her more confidence to enter the guild. To make manners worse, the sun was beginning to fall.

She breathed in deeply, really nervous. She then slowly began walking towards the door, stepping over the grate on the ground. Just as she was going over it, a voice shouted from deep down the hole, scaring the living daylights out of her. “POKEMON DETECTED! POKEMON DETECTED!”

Then, another voice shouted, this one louder than the other. “Whose footprint is it?! WHOSE FOOTPRINT IS IT?!” There was a three second silence, during the which a million images of her falling down an endless hole flooded her mind, shaking like a leaf. The first voice shouted again.

“THE FOOTPRINT IS EEVEE'S! THE FOOTPRINT IS EEVEE'S!” That was it for her. She jumped backwards with a shout. How did they know it was her? She didn't know. She didn't want to know. She just wanted to get out of there, too scared to think.

She began walking backwards hastily, though tripping on her feet and rolling down the stairs. During five whole seconds, she saw her world spinning around, somersaulting down the stairs, a part of her body hitting the stone steps. After what felt like an eternity, she stopped rolling down the steps, as she had reached the bottom. She managed to land of her feet, but fell flat on her face, feeling really dizzy because of all her movement. She quickly got on her paws and shook her head, focusing. She got up and shook the dust off her fur. While tapping her neck however, she noticed that her stone relic was missing. She frantically looked around, and saw it not too far away from her, to her left. She rushed to it and picked it up, looking around to see if someone saw her.

This could sound weird, since it was just a piece of rock. However, it wouldn't be the first time someone had tried to steal it from her. Some pokemon were really that stupid to think it was valuable, which it was, for her at least. She looked up the stairs, and started running away from them without hesitation, small tears on her face. Because of her haste, she didn't realize two shapes staring at her from the bushes.

“Zubat... did you see that?” One of them asked. The other, some kind of blue bat, which didn't seem to have eyes.

“Of course I didn't you jackass! Though I did hear all of that. Whatever it was... it sounded valuable didn't it?” He asked. Koffing, which was some kind of purple rock which was floating in the air thanks to some foul smelling gas, which you didn't really notice until you got really close to him.

“Yeah, it did... And the way she hid it... we might be able to sell it for a good chunk somewhere... And there's also that nice piece that carried it around... I think you know where I am going with this…” He said, a wicked smile on his face. Zubat smiled as well, his mouth making a smile that could send shivers up anyone spine, not because of how wicked it was, but of how horribly shaped his teeth were.

“Oh yeah... I know where you are going with this Koffing... Let's go after her and have some fun…” He said, chuckling as they both got out of the bushes and slowly walking towards the beach.

“Hey Diglett! What happened?!” A voice asked from the hole.

“I don't know! I think something might've happened to whoever wanted to come in!” Diglett answered. He was a really small, brown pokemon, whose head popped up from the ground, since he was always inside of it. He had a large pink nose and tiny, beady black eyes. “Maybe you guys should go out and check if something's wrong!”

“Hold on! I'll tell the others!” The other voice answered.

Diglett heard some steps that faded. A few seconds later he could hear a lot of pokemon talking and arguing. After a few minutes, another voice came to the hole. “Diglett, we are going out and see who was at the door.”

Before the the voice disappeared, Diglett shouted. “It was an Eevee! Look for an Eevee!” He said. Right after that the other voice was gone, and he was left alone... again. His father wasn't there either, so he was the only in the guild again. He sighed. He offered to stay, but he knew that in the end he was the one to always stay in the guild. It saddened him, but as his father said, he wasn't ready yet for adventuring out in the world, but he would be ready soon. This gave him hopes of being able to go with his father and friends sooner or later.

He decided to just bury under the earth and rest. No one was going to come into the guild anyways, and he was pretty sure that the guildmaster had the keys for the stairs. Just outside the guild, inside of the tent, there was an open shaft with a set of stairs popping out.

Eevee stopped running once she got to the beach. She looked back to see if anyone had been following her, but it didn't seem like it. She sighed in disappointment. She thought she could do it... After almost two years of looking at the guild... and trying to learn how to get in... And she had screwed everything up. They knew who she was, and they probably would mock her the next day... It was going to be a long week. She'd get over it though... alone... with no one to help her... She shrugged. It wouldn't be much different from the rest of her life really. Sleepless nights? Alone. Puberty? Alone. Emotional crisis? Also alone. She didn't need anyone. She was fine by herself. Always was, always will.

 

([ **Hopes and Dreams** **– Pokémon Mystery Dungeon**](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sCssXqWmfo4))

 

It sounded sad, and... it was in fact. Everyday, she would walk around Treasure Town, and she could see all these couples that would be walking around, enjoying eachother's company. She had sometimes dreamed of how it could feel to... to share your life with someone. Share your problems... Your thoughts... To love someone... She didn't think too much about it though, and tried to focus on her daily life.

It all boiled down to waking up, going to work, and then walk around town, sometimes wandering off from there, though not too far, since she could get lost. Sometimes she would go down to the beach in the afternoon. No one was there at that time. And she could just stare at the setting sun. It was beautiful and... romantic. She didn't think anyone knew that such a view existed. Except for the Krabby that lived there of course. They didn't talk much however, not even to her, who usually came there every two or three days. The only thing they did was create bubbles, which floated around the beach.

The combination of the peaceful waves crashing against the rocks and sand, the small bubbles which floated around, which reflected the light of setting, making a beautiful scenery. She always came down there and walked along the shore, the water flowing upwards gently, caressing her paws. It was wonderful. She always came there when she was really depressed, and it always raised her spirits. She sat on the sand and looked at the sun.

She could stare at it for days... Thinking about the adventures that laid beyond the sea... The unknown lands... The amazing treasures... Every time she thought about them, her heart pumped a thousand miles per hour. She had always dreamed of being an explorer, but each time she tried to do it she was quickly overcome by fear… She had more reasons than just fame or treasure… But now that she looked at the sun, she knew... She would make it!

She rose from the sand with determination. She was set on going back up those stairs, and finally joining that guild, and making her dreams come true! She's been strong from now on, and not the chicken she had used to be! Never again she would stutter in front of anyone, or be afraid of a situation! She would always shine in the end and triumph over the adversities! “I will make it!” She shouted, her voice sounding over the bubbles, and immediately going into an unconscious pokemon's ears, who groaned in pain as her voice made its head hurt like hell once again, snapping it out of unconsciousness.

 

( **Stop the music** )

 

Eevee immediately snapped out of it, staring at the pokemon. And she immediately freaked out. “ **Oh Arceus, are you alright?!** ” She shouted hysterically, running up to it. She looked at the pokemon. It was a blue Riolu, which was laying on the sand. It's legs were wet and covered in sand, and there markings near it, which probably meant it had dragged itself across the sand. It had two small blue ears which popped up from it's head. She had heard about Riolus before, and she was amazed at it's face, as it seemed to have some kind of mask which surrounded it's eyes. This "mask" seemed to grow out of it's head, an ended in some dangling extremities, which looked like ears. The upper part of it's torso was black, while the lower part was blue. It had two arms which didn't have the normal bumps on the back of his forepaws for some reason. It's legs were black and it had a blue tail.

She didn't know if it was a male or a female, and she sure as hell wasn't going to find out. She poked it with her paw, and, to her horror, it didn't move. Her face went pale, as she rose from the ground and started running around, really scared. “ **Oh Arceus they’re dead! No no no this can’t be happening… Someone, please help, oh Arceus no no n-** ” The riolu groaned again, as it slowly opened it's eyes. Its head hurt a lot, probably from all the screaming she had done. She stopped running and slowly edged closer to it. The riolu closed its eyes again, breathing heavily. It opened them once more and was shocked to find Eevee's face looking straight at his. His headache seemed to clear instantly, as it suddenly incorporated itself, sitting on the sand and shouted, obviously startled to find the pokemon's face right in front of him.

“Whoa!” He shouted, got onto his feet and jumped backwards. Just as he landed, he flinched in pain, as his whole body seemed to complain from his sudden movement. “Step back!” He shouted suddenly, hissing in pain. From the sound of it, he was male.

She looked at him. “Calm down!” She shouted, obviously scared of anything he could do. He stared at her, dumbfounded.

“Did... did you just speak?!”  He asked in shock.

She looked at him, really confused.”Um... Yeah? I told you to calm down.” He was still freaking out however.

“Calm down?! You're a talking fox! How do you want me to calm down?!” He shouted. Eevee just looked at him, really confused now.

“What did you call me?! I'm an Eevee! Not a Vulpix! Are you blind?” She was a bit offended, though she wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt.

“No, I am not blind. I have really good eyesight, thank you, and I can clearly see that you are a talking fox who is screaming way too much. Who or what are you anyways?” He asked. Now she was getting a bit offended at the riolu.

“I'm an Eevee and my name is El... “She put her paws on her mouth before she pronounced the rest of her name. “Eevee! My name is Eevee!” The riolu tilted his head, raising an eyebrow. “Wait, so your name is Eevee, and you are an Eevee?” He asked. She nodded, feeling a bit uneasy. He was still looking at her. “Eevee the Eevee?” She felt even more uneasy.

“Y..yes... Haven’t you heard of those identity thieves?” Now she was confused. She’d thought everyone knew that... ‘ _I should've picked another different name… Damn it for reading so much my imagination just isn’t good at all, is it?_ ’

The riolu just shrugged however. “Whatever, I won't question your name choice. My name is Eric, and... I am…” He looked at himself.

“I am…” She looked at him. He was spinning around himself, trying to make out his own body. “I.. am…” He stopped spinning around.”I have no idea of what I am.” Eevee felt like her body grow weak and she almost collapsed on the sand.

“What? What do you mean you don't know?” She said, regaining her composure.

Eric shrugged. “I have no idea of what I am, seriously…”

Eevee sighed. “Alright... where do you live?” Eric brought a paw up to his chin, trying to think. After a few minutes his face went blank.”Ok, you are starting to scare me. Where are we?” She asked again, this time really worried for the Riolu.

Eric's face went into one of pure horror. “I don't know!” He shouted, really desperate. “I don't... I don't remember anything other than my name!”

Eevee stared at him. “Wait, you mean that you've lost your memory?! How?!” She asked.

“I... I don't know!” He felt confused and scared at the same time. Where was he? What was he? How did he get there and what was he doing there? And how in the world did he lose his memory?

Just when he was going to ask Eevee where he was, he noticed two creatures fly up behind Eevee in a moment and pushing her into him. She fell right on top of him, pushing both of them to the ground. In the time it took him to blink he was on the ground, laying on his back and Eevee right on top of him, their faces mere inches away from eachother, her big sky blue eyes staring at him. He was looking back at her with his red eyes. They both tried to get away from eachother, their closeness growing uncomfortable for both of them. They both heard laughter from behind Eevee.

She rolled off from Eric's body, and just then, he noticed how heavy she actually was. However, what called his attention the most were the two creatures that were staring at them. One of them was some kind of purple rock and the other was a blue bat.

They were both laughing at them apparently. “Oh why don't you look at that! Looks like our little friend here has found a partner!” The purple rock said. The bat laughed as well.

“Well, it was us who wanted to have fun with her, but I guess she's occupied now.”

Eevee looked at both of them, really mad. “Hey! What the hell is wrong with you! And who might you be anyways?!” She asked. Both of them laughed again.

“I am Zubat, and this is Koffing! We were both watching you trying to enter the guild, and we couldn't help but notice you had a really interesting piece hanging from your neck.” The bat said.

“Yeah.” The purple rock laughed. “And we couldn't help but borrow it from you! I hope you don't mind if we have it for a while!” He shouted.

Eevee rubbed her neck, looking for her necklace. However, she didn't find it hanging from her neck. “Oh no.. Oh no... Where is it?! WHERE IS IT?!” She shouted, looking around frantically. And then she saw it, hanging from Zubat's neck. “You looking for this?” He mocked.

She stared at him, and her face showed pure anger. “You jerk! Give it back!” She shouted, jumping into him. Zubat simply flew higher and Eevee missed. Koffing charged into her while airborne, pushing her into the sand with force. She slid for a few feet, really weak to even get up. She moved her head and looked at her attackers, who were still laughing at her. Eric was watching the whole thing from very close, though he had decided to let it play out. He didn't know who those guys were. Eevee got back up from the sand. “Give it back!” She shouted.

Both of them flew over to a cave in the rocks. “Come get it chicken!” They shouted, as they both disappeared into the darkness. Not even looking at Eric, she charged into the cave. He tried to go after her, but evaluated his options. He didn't know who she was, and he was pretty sure that the name she had told him was fake. Also, she looked quite set on getting that stone back, so she would probably do it alone.

Eric hoped she was all right by herself and thought about what to do next. He looked around the beach, and he saw some bubbles floating around. He looked for the source, but couldn't find it. He saw some steps at the other side of the beach. He walked up to the steps and climbed up. He got up to a crossroad, where a sign stood with three arrows pointing to the north, east and south. He read out loud the signs from top to bottom. “North... ‘Wigglytuff's Guild’, to the east ... ‘Treasure Town’, to the south ‘Beach’.” He looked around. There were four paths in that intersection, but only three arrows. He looked at the other path, and saw that it lead to really big plains. The path probably lead outside the borders and out into the world. However, he wasn't very keen on that idea, he wanted to ask around town and check out that guild.

Just then, he saw a bird flap over to where he was. “Hey! Have you seen an Eevee around here?” The bird asked. It looked more like a parrot, with it's head shaped like a music note, a pink beak, blue wings, a green body with a yellow part near it's neck, which was surrounded by white feathers.

”An eevee? Umm…” Eric froze on the spot. ‘ _Maybe he's looking for her? Wait... maybe he's in with one of those guys!_ ’

“I’m gonna guess you haven't. If you do, then inform us, we are in the guild up those stairs.” The bird pointed up the stairs north of them. 2We think she might be in great danger.” And with that, the bird flew off again.

Eric was sweating. ‘ _In great danger?! What if those guys are…_ ’ His head was filled with thought s of what those two could do to her. He remembered her panicking when she thought he was dead, and also how they had sent her into the sand with just one hit. They were also two against one! Eric hit his head. ‘ _You damn idiot! She's at a disadvantage and you leave her alone?! You selfish prick!_ ’ He shouted to himself. And then he noticed that she had saved his life as well. If it hadn't been for her, he wouldn't have woken up, and would've drowned in the sea. He turned on a dime and ran back down the stairs, charging into the beach cave.

* * *

 

As soon as he got in, the smell of salt and water filled his nostrils. I wasn't a pleasant smell, though it wasn't something that was disgusting either. This smell was probably caused by the huge puddles of seawater that was stuck between the rocks. No one knew how long that water had been stuck in there, so it was only natural that it smelled like that. Come to think of it, it could smell worse, much worse. He ignored the smell, as he focused on the path that laid in front of him. The cave was really strange. There a couple of rocky paths which lead onwards and downwards, which was natural of any cave, but the strange thing was that to the left, the cave ended a few feet away in a wall of rocks, but to his right, it ended in sharps rocks which made as a barrier from the waves from the sea, as that part was open to the outside. Because of this, some light came inside, allowing him to see clearly.

Because the floor was completely covered in sand, and thanks to the light, he could notice paw prints that lead inwards. They were probably Eevee's, since the other two pokemon could float over the ground, and didn't leave any marks. He ran down the path for a couple of minutes, before he came up to some shells laying around around the ground. They were purple oyster shells. And they were big. Really big. Way too big for a normal oyster. And they weren't oysters. They were Shelldos, as he soon discovered when they rose from the ground and started crawling towards him. The shells opened, revealing a long red tongue and a pair of googly eyes. He stared at the creatures. There were four of them. They didn't seem much of a threat and they did move pretty slowly, so Eric continued on his way, careful to not step close to any of them.

After a minute of hastily walking, the oyster pokemon were out of view behind the rocks, though he knew they'd probably be waiting for him on the way back. He looked at the sand and noticed that the trail was gone. ‘ _I must've missed it when those things appeared…_ ’ He looked around and decided to go back a few feet. It wasn't long before he found the path again, this time leading to the open side of the cave, near the spiky rocks. And it was there where he saw some movement.

He crouched down and began approaching the area, hiding behind the rocks that he found in his way. Once he got close to the area where he had seen movement, he peeled his eyes. And just then he saw Eevee fall to the ground, her fur completely messed up and eyes closed. She was unconscious. Or at least that's what Eric thought, as he saw her slowly open her eyes. She was at the verge of exhaustion in fact, and couldn't really move anymore. She could feel the poison that Koffing had used on her slowly sapping her strength away. It wasn't going to kill her, but it would leave her completely defenseless to any of their desires. And that's why she was so terrified. She knew what they were going to do to her, and she was crying.

Koffing and Zubat noticed this and started laughing. “Oh don't worry, you'll like it as much as we will. Just relax and you'll have a good time.”

Eric understood what the duo meant. _‘They are going to…’_ He made his head pop out from his hiding place to look at them. They were both next to her. ‘ _Disgusting…_ ’ Koffing looked at his partner.

“So, who has the first go?” He asked.

Zubat turned his head to him. “I will of course, I was the one that did the most work.” The bat replied.

The purple ball however had something to say to that. “Oh hell nah, I poisoned her! Your attacks almost didn't do shit! She wouldn't be like this if I hadn't done anything!”

They were both arguing. Eric smiled to himself, as he still had enough time to think a strategy... He just then looked at Eevee's face. He saw her tears stream down her face, staining her brown fur and making the sand around her head wet. She was lying on the ground, completely defenseless, in a humiliating position as her attackers were deciding who was going to use her first. She was in agony. That was it for Eric. He didn't have any time to think. He had to act right then. And he was going to act at that very instant.

 

([Multiplayer Battle Theme – Pokémon XD: Gale of Darkness](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjVbri2XTVA))

 

“Fine then! Why don't we share her?! You get the mouth and I'll go with her…” A rock soared through the air at an amazing speed and hit Zubat straight in his mouth, the rock getting stuck in his mouth, muffling him and making him unable to say anything. Koffing cursed in surprise, and Eevee turned her head to look at the direction the stone had come from. She saw the riolu she had helped on the beach running straight towards the poison pokemon. She saw how he jumped into the air and pulled his legs back into his body. Just as he was at the same height the other pokemon was, he shot them forward, hitting the purple rock with full force, sending him flying straight into Zubat, who spit out the rock from the blow.

Eric landed on his back, but jumped up from the ground and onto his feet, looking at Eevee and running towards her. “Are you ok?” He asked. She tried her hardest to nod, but it only came as a simple movement. He nodded and turned his view to the other two pokemon. Zubat was trying to get Koffing off him, who appeared to be knocked out. Eric moved to her side and grabbed the front legs, putting her right paw on his right shoulder and holding all her weight with his left arm as he wrapped it around her waist, effectively carrying her out. “Come on, I'm going to get you out of here!” He shouted.

Just then, Zubat got his companion off him and looked straight at them. He flew up from the ground and charged straight for the duo. He opened his mouth and let out a really high-pitched screech. The sound waves seemed to move across the air, and both Eevee's and Eric's ears began to hurt. He immediately dropped to the floor as his headache came back to him, this time only stronger. He got on his knees and covered his ears, trying to soften the sound. He looked around and saw the bat pokemon straight in his face. Without hesitation, the riolu threw a right punch into Zubat's face, lading in his mouth again, making him shut up.

However, the bat closed his maw and bit down on his arm. Eric howled in pain and bashed Zubat's head with his left arm, the fist hitting his maw, making the bat let go of his another arm. Not letting up, Eric profited from the sudden confusion of the attack and put his paws together, spinning to his left and bashing Zubat yet again, this time with both of his fists together, the power of the hit sending the pokemon flying straight in a rock. Some white seemed to fly off from his mouth, followed by a tiny string of blood. With Zubat out of the way, Eric could see how Koffing was floating his way, and was almost in front of him.

Eric put his paws up and braced for the impact, which came seconds later. His feet slid across the sand, but managed to stay put.

He got a good hold of the pokemon that was in front of him. However, their proximity served to his advantage, as he let go a chunk of poisonous, which Eric unfortunately breathed in. He immediately coughed at the smell, but didn't let go of the other pokemon. He flexed his knees and got impulse. And seconds later, he jumped up into the air. His hold of Koffing however made him spin in mid-air, making him flip around on top of him. Koffing tried to follow him with his eyes, which he didn't manage to do. However, Eevee, who laying next to them saw how the riolu turned upside down in mid-air, still grabbing her attacker Once he got completely over him, he used the force of the movement to move Koffing. The result was Koffing being lifted further off the ground, following Eric as they both arched in the air.

All things that went up, had to go down, and Eric knew this. When they began to fall, he leaned forward, making his body spin the same direction. Using all of this momentum, he aimed Koffing down into the earth and threw his arms downwards into the sand, letting go of his enemy afterwards. Koffing was thrown downwards into the ground, crashing into the sand with great force, raising what felt like a wall of sand, making a crater in the which he was half buried. Eric spun around a few more times before he fell on his knees. He rose his head and looked in front of him. Both of his enemies were knocked out. The battle was over.

 

( **Stop the music** )

 

He turned around to look at Eevee, who was lying on the ground, her belly up, her eyes widened in shock as she stared at the cave. He saw Zubat lying a few feet away from her, his wings twitching every so often. Koffing, who was closer to them, was even worse. He was half buried in sand, about four to five inches inside. Eric was up on his feet, looking at her. His fur wasn't even messed up, apart from his right arm, which seemed to be bleeding a bit. He came closer to her and got on his knees. “You feeling better?”

She nodded. She was in fact feeling much better, as the poison had started losing it's effect.”Your arm though…” She said.

He looked at it and shrugged. “Nah. It's just a scratch. Come on, I'll help you up.” He offered her his left paw, which she gladly took.

Once she was up on her four legs, they both walked up to Zubat. Thankfully, he was still wearing Eevee's necklace. Eric grabbed it from him and handed it over to the fox-like pokemon, who hung it around her neck again. Once all of that was over with, they both began making their way back to the entrance. The way out was easier than the way in, as the just had to walk towards the entrance, which was visible from they were at. The pokemon that had popped up around Eric before were lying around. He was worried that they might surround them again. However, none of them got up. They had probably followed him to the fight and after seeing what he could do, they decided to let him go. He was too big of a fish for them.

Once out, they both noticed the sun was almost down. There were, once again, bubbles floating around the beach. They hadn't spoken to eachother on the way out. When they were at the beach however, she looked at him. “Umm... Eric was it?” She asked.

He turned and looked at her, nodding. “Yeah. What is it?” He tried to not sound blunt about it.

She flinched a bit, obviously caught off by his response. “I wanted to say... thank you for saving me... and... helping me recover my... stone relic.” She was stuttering a lot. Not because he was intimidating, which... he kind of was in fact. It was also the fact that he had helped her. And he hadn't asked anything in return. Yet.

“Is... that what you call it?" He asked, obviously referring to her necklace. “Why? It's just a stone. Right?” He asked.

She shook her head. “Well... Yes and no.” She grabbed the rock hanging from her neck and handed it out, showing it to Eric. “You see... I found this about five years ago, in a cave not too far from here. At normal sight it just looks like a normal stone, but... if you look closer to it…” She said. Eric inched closer to her, showing a bit of interest, which, to be honest, at first was faked, but after inspecting the stone from close, he noticed something interesting. There were white lines on the stone, which made strange patterns on the surface.

“What... What is that?” He asked, looking at her. She looked back at him with her sky blue eyes, which were lit right now.

“I don't know! And that's why it's so important to me. This thing could easily be just a kid's drawing on a rock, or someone's prank on me... but…” She turned her head away from the riolu and looked at the sea. “It could also be the key to a great treasure that sleeps somewhere in this land... Or the map needed to find a lost land... It could also be that!” She shouted. Eric looked at her. “Because of this, I decided to keep it. I used to have a lot more imagination when I was younger... And this little rock fueled it for almost a third of my life. Each time I would look at it, I would fly away into my imagination, where I was one of the greatest explorers of all time... where I discovered an ancient land... or a great treasure... And in all of those…” She stared at him once again.

“This stone relic appeared! I knew from the very moment I saw it, that I wanted to unveil its mysteries! Where did it come from? What did it do? Why was it there? I wanted to know so bad! And... after so much time of imagining... I decided it was time to make my dreams come true, and my idea of joining the Explorer's Guild began to grow. I observed for months how they worked, how they related with eachother. Hell, I even got a work at a market where many explorers came by to buy or sell their stuff! And every now and then... One or two would stay, and they would narrate them their adventures... Running through evil pokemon infested caves... Rescuing those in need... And discovering treasures and new places... It was a dream!”

Her happy look died down though, as she suddenly looked depressed. “However... There's one big problem. You need at least two pokemon to form a team and... I don't really have any friends here... and I didn't really want to make them either. Also... As you may have heard before... I am the biggest coward in the world. I got freaked out just from the sight of you being unconscious. I don't really qualify for being a good explorer at all.” Her ears fell down to the sides of her head. She looked really depressed as she had closed her eyes, completely defeated. But Eric could feel like there was more to it than just wanting to find treasures and discover ancient lands… She was hiding her true motivations, but he didn’t pry.

He breathed in deeply. “Yep. You're a big coward, I guess, but… you’re also got a big dream A dream which, quite honestly, I didn't even think you had at first glance.” His words were those of motivation, but given how she had acted a few minutes ago… he had his doubts if she’d ever be able of achieving those goals. It was kind of sad, really...

Eevee felt offended, sad, flattered and surprised at the same time, though she decided to listen at what Eric wanted to say. “When you said you weren't a good explorer at all, I need to remind you that you ran straight into that cave right after those who had stolen what was yours. You didn't even ask for help, and, unfortunately, I thought you were ok alone. Even if at the end you failed, it was the intention that mattered in the end. Also, you quite literally saved my life a few minutes ago.” She looked at him, surprised, and he smiled in response.

“Yeah, you did. If it hadn't been by you and your screaming, I wouldn't have probably woken up, and I would have probably been washed away by the water and ended up drowning in the sea. It was only fair I repaid you really. Thank you.” He was actually being honest: he didn’t know, nor wanted to know what could’ve happened if she hadn’t awakened him with her screaming.

Eevee was now really confused. “Umm... No problem I guess... I guess we are even now?” She asked. He nodded, looking down at the sand.

‘Should I ask her to help me? I mean... She knows the area, so maybe she knows where to go…’ He thought.

At the same time, she was also evaluating her options. ‘He's strong... He's brave and... he actually helped for a change... Maybe he could help me get over my cowardice problem and…’ She thought of it. She looked at Eric. She gulped down and bit the bullet, as she looked at him.”Eric... Would you... would you form an exploration team with me?” She asked bluntly. A long, awkward silence rose between the two.

“Form... an exploration team... with you?” He asked. She nodded.

“Yes! I... I know I've just met you but... I don't know why... you give me confidence Eric... You are much braver and stronger than I am... So please... Join a team with me!” She pleaded.

He stared at her. “I... I don't even know what an exploration team is…”

For some reason, Eevee's legs lost all their strength and she fell to the sand. “What? Haven't you been listening to all I've told you?!” She asked, a bit confused and angry.

Eric rose both of his paws a bit and shook them, moving his head sideways. ”No no no no! I've been listening to all you've said! The thing is... I don't really have it clear... And I don't really know if it's a good idea... I mean, I've lost memory and... Come to think of it, maybe I could be in trouble... I mean, there's got to be a good reason I was lying on a beach, unconscious, and when I wake up I find out that I've lost all my memories.” He explained.

What he said made sense. And this is what made Eevee sad. He was right. She had just asked something really important to someone she had both met recently and that had lost all of his memories, so he couldn't even remember who was, or what he had to do and where he came from. And she only thought of getting him into something else that wasn't related to him in any way whatsoever. He wasn’t done talking though. “However... From what I've understood... These exploration teams seem to wander off quite a lot and discover many things, right?” Eevee looked at him and nodded, the look on her face slowly changing.

“Not only that but... You seem to be the only one I can trust around here. You could show me around, and try to help me recover my memories and... I help you achieve your dreams. How's that sound?” He asked.

Her face lit up . “So... you're saying yes?” She asked. He nodded, smiling. “Yes. I think it may be a good idea to make a team with you Eevee.” She jumped up from the ground from the glee, as she let out a loud squeal.

“Yes! Yes! Thank you, thank you, thank you!” She shouted, grabbing Eric's left arm and shaking it up and down. He couldn’t help but smile, but he had a bad feeling creeping around in the back of his head… was he really joining her to form a team because of all the above… or because he just felt bad for her?

* * *

 

After calming down, Eevee explained Eric what they had to do. She guided him to the guild's entrance, which was located atop of the hill, which could be climbed up by simply walking up them. The guild wasn't really welcoming at first glance though. It was... strange to say the least. The tent and the wooden heads on sticks just sent shivers up both their spines, and Eric couldn't help but notice the barricades. What was up with those? His attention had been drawn however, by the open gate. The pink tent had a gate, which was lifted. The great in the middle of the way didn't really bother him too much though. It looked solid enough to hold their weight if they walked over it. Then again, they didn't even have to walk over it, since they could just go around it. They did this, since Eevee seemed to get really nervous when they got close to it. Once they got to the gate, they had a peek inside of the tent, and they could see some kind of hole, from which some stairs seemed to pop up. ”What's that?” Eric asked.

Deep below, Diglett suddenly woke up. He could've sworn he had felt someone walk up in front of the entrance. “I don't know.” Said Eevee. “But it looks like an open hole with some stairs leading down.” Diglett freaked out. There was someone out there. He didn't even know who they were, and the worst part was that he was completely alone. He dug himself under the ground and started digging towards town.

He popped up from the ground around the main plaza. Luckily, just in front of the rest of the guildmembers. “ **Guys, there’s someone at the guild entrance, and they’re trying to get in right now**!” He shouted, clearly scared. Everyone looked at the multicolored bird that Eric had met before. “Chatot... Did you close the door?” Diglett asked.

Eric and Eevee were deciding if they should go down or not. They had shouted for anyone that could come out and welcome them. After a while of responses, Eric sighed. “You know what. Let's go in, see what's going on. Maybe there's someone, and if there's not, it's not like we are going to do anything bad right?” He said. Oddly, that sounded reasonable. Eric decided to go down the stairs first. He began climbing down the ladder, and just when only his head was seen, he saw little the little pebbles around him begin shaking. It looked liked it was an earthquake first, but then they heard them.

Behind Eevee, what looked like a stampede of many types of pokemon appeared out of nowhere, all of them charging at the duo, screaming. “ **INTRUDERS!”** They both freaked out. Eevee jumped straight into the hole, and didn't remember that Eric was, in fact, still climbing down. Because of this, she bumped into him, making the riolu lose his balance and they both fell to the ground below. Eric hit the ground first. After the fall, which wasn't really that long, he had expected to be a little hurt, but he was surprised to see he was just fine. That was until Eevee fell on top of him. She wasn't even remotely close to fat, or at least she looked like it, but he felt like a 100-pound rock had fallen on him.

He howled in pain, as his friend had fallen on his back, as he had face planted on the ground. He felt all the air leave his lungs. He called her out. “Eevee! Get off! You're crushing me!” He shouted. She had landed on something soft, which had prevented her from getting hurt from the fall.

When she looked down and saw her new friend, she yelped in surprise. “Sorry! Sorry!” She shouted, quickly getting of him. He breathed in heavily as he desperately needed air. He instantly got up ad shook the dust off him. He looked around. They seemed to be in a cavern in the ground, with some windows which led outside, where the sun was almost set already. He saw two bulletin boards, and there was some kind of reception near the window to their right. There were some vines that came out of some parts of the walls, and some moss seemed to cover some parts of it.

“Eevee... How much do you weight? You almost killed me there!” He asked.

Eevee instantly glared daggers at him. “What did you say?” She asked. He looked at her, and instantly regretted ever mentioning her weight.

“Umm... Nothing. I must weight a lot, since I fell like a stone, but... you're just as lightweight as a feather!” He shouted, slowly walking backwards and away from her. She started walking towards him menacingly.  

“Oh... I heard what you said pretty well... Get over here!” She shouted.

Just when she was about to pounce on him again, they both heard someone shout from the top of the stairs. “Both of you criminals! Get out here right now or we'll have to go in ourselves!” They both froze.

Eric sighed. “Oh great... Now we've done it…” He said, blaming both of them.

However, Eevee was still mad about before. “What do you mean ‘we’?! It was you who had the great idea of coming down here, and you didn't even know if someone was in!” She shouted at him. He looked at her.

“Oh, you're blaming me?! You were the one that had the idea of making an exploration team!”

“And you said yes!”

While this was all happening, the pokemon outside of the hole were listening to their whole conversation, which didn't seem to reach and end after a few seconds. Chatot sighed. “Umm... Diglett?” The digging pokemon looked at him. “I don't think they are criminals. They might be just pokemon who wanted to check out something in the guild.” Diglett frowned.

“Well... I don't really now... I didn't really ask them, I just jolted to Treasure Town.” He said. All of the pokemon around there sighed at the same time.

“Well... Guess we'll have to sort this out…” Chatot said as he began flying down the stairs. Once down, he saw a Riolu and an Eevee, the eevee on top of the riolu, her right paw holding his face against the ground while the riolu was pushing her head back with his right paw, trying to keep away from him.

He coughed. Both of them immediately stopped ‘fighting’ and stared at him. “You are the duo that got into the guild right? Well... I am sorry but there was a little misunderstanding and we thought you were some criminals. We deeply apologize.” He said, staring at both of them. He blinked for one second, and the next both of them were standing upright and looking at him. “So... care to tell me why you came here? Publicity? Travelers looking for a place to stay. I don't really know any of you…” He looked at Eric, and his eyes widened. “Wait, you're the riolu from before! What are you doing here, weren't you supposed to be looking for the…” And then he looked at Eevee, who was standing next to him. There was a long silence between all of them. ”Well... looks like you found them alright…” Chatot said.

After a few minutes of talking and convincing Chatot they weren't trying to sell them anything, they finally got around to present themselves. Chatot looked at the jackal, raising an eyebrow and rubbing his chin. “Eric, eh? Guess you didn't want to go with a fake name then… very well, your problem.” He said. Eric stared at him.

“What? What do you mean?” Chatot tilted his head, a bit confused.

“What? Haven't you heard about those identity thieves? There's some Dittos running around…” He began, however, Eric interrupted him once more, and asked what a ‘Ditto’ was, which really caught Chatot off guard. “What do you mean what's a Ditto?! Where did you learn? I have never seen you around here, where are you from anyways?!” He asked, now a little bit mad. He thought the riolu was mocking him.

Eevee intervened in the conversation.  “He's lost all of his memory, he doesn't remember anything. She explained. The bird's face went into one of shock.

“What?! You mean he's got amnesia?! Oh dear Arceus!” He started flying around, really nervous. He suddenly stopped, his face showing pure anger. “You should've informed me of this earlier!” He shouted. Eric and Eevee sighed.

“It's not like we had a chance.” She said. “Yeah, you've been the only one who's really been talking in this conversation, and we didn't even get close to that topic…” He said.

Chatot seemed to become embarrassed for a short while, probably because they were right, but regained his composure. “Well, let's skip all of that... So you say you wanted to be create an Exploration Team?” He asked. Both Eric and Eevee nodded at the same time. “Very well then. Unfortunately, I can't do that right away, since I do need some information from you. However, we can't talk this right here. Come with me.” He said. Chatot walked away to the stairs. It was then when Eric noticed there were another set of stairs right next to the one they had just fell down, and it seemed to go even deeper. “Follow me!” He repeated, as he flew down the stairs. Eric and Eevee walked up to the new set and climbed down. Just up the other set of stairs, the rest of the guildmembers were waiting in front of the tent.

“Should we go down there? Maybe he's in trouble?” Someone asked.

“Are you serious?! This is Chatot we are talking about here! He's probably just beating those no good outlaws right now” Another one said. Diglett turned around. “I don't even think they are outlaws guys.”

Another voice, this one the loudest rose above the rest. “What do you mean! Those guys are serious criminals! They just broke into the guild without asking permission! That's some serious law breaking right there!” Just when he finished another voice, this time female shouted back.

“Oh my gosh Loudred! Why are you so loud, you almost blew my ears and petals off!” Another voice shouted, this one female.

The one known as Loudred spoke back. “Sorry Sunflora!” However, since his voice was naturally loud, it didn't really help much that he answered.

”Loudred don't shout into my ears!” Sunflora screamed again.

And once more, Loudred began apologizing. “You know I can't help it…”

This time though, he was cut off by everyone around him, as they all shouted in unison. “ **SHUT UP!”** Loudred felt like a small tear appeared out of corner of his eye.

“You guys are jerks you know…” He said, this time whispering, but, since his voice was so loud, everyone heard it, though they didn't reply.

Diglett just sighed. “I just hope he's ok and gets over with it…” He said to everyone. A cold burst of wind blew, sending chills up their spines. “And fast…”

* * *

 

Eric and Eevee followed Chatot to the lowest level of the guild, or at least that's what Eric thought, since there were no more stairs leading down. He saw some kind of stall to their right, and to their left there was a tunnel that, from what Chatot told them, lead to the apprentices bedrooms, while the ones that were in front of the stairs lead to the individual bedrooms of each of the guilds 's inhabitants, such as him, the Guildmaster, Croagunk and Diglett and his father, Dugtrio. However, he didn't go into any of these, but actually went to the left, where, hidden by the perspective, was a door with a pink pattern on it. Eric recognized the pattern, as it had the same shape as the tent outside. “Chatot, what is this door?” Eric asked. The bird didn't bother to look back at him.

“This is the guildmaster's room. We are going to ask him to make your team. Under no circumstances and I REPEAT no circumstances talk back to the guildmaster without his permission or speak to him rudely. The consequences might be beyond my reach.” He knocked at the door with his right wing. Meanwhile, Eric and Eevee looked at eachother, both of their faces showing an uneasy expression. They heard someone from the inside say something. “It's me Guildmaster! Chatot! I am coming in!” With that, Chatot opened the door, which revealed another room.

Eric and Eevee walked in, as they looked around, inspecting the room. The room wasn't really big, as the space where someone could walk was even smaller. There were two huge chest on the left and on the right of the room, which were semi open and showed many goods. Eevee could see money, jewels, orbs and some... apples? Actually, more than half of the stuff in the chests were apples, which confused her further.

She wanted to comment this to Eric, but he seemed to notice this before she did. “Look at all those apples…” He said. She nodded, as she kept looking at the room.

Two tall torches stood at the sides of a carpet that was extended on the middle of the stone floor. There was a smaller chest on this one, and some medium sized chests at the bottom of the room, right below a circle shaped window. Right in front of the carpet, and looking away from the newcomers, was a pink creature. It had big bunny ears, and seemed to be doing something... There was a faint munching sound coming from it. Was it eating? Chatot seemed to notice this. ”Umm... Guildmaster…” He called again. The ‘guildmaster’ stopped eating, and their ears perked up. Chatot looked at them, confused. “Guildmaster?” Chatot asked again.

Suddenly, the creature turned around on a dime, looking straight at them with its big green eyes. Eric could see that the belly part of his body was white, and seemed to be covered in little bits of apples, and some fluids, which could probably be apple juice. It didn't disappoint him, since he was said half-munched apple in their left paw. “Hiya!” They suddenly shouted. The voice sounded male, so Eric assumed so, though his body made it hard to believe. “Welcome to Wigglytuff's Guild! Welcome! Welcome!” He shouted again, making a reverence. Both Eric and Eevee were really confused. He was... weird, to say the least, she thought.

Wasn't he supposed to be the guildmaster? This pink... fluff ball... was Wigglytuff? The Wigglytuff she had heard so much about? One of the greatest explorers of it's time? “Guess you can't trust a book by it's cover…” She muttered to herself, soft enough for none to hear… or so she thought.

“Yeah, that's what they say!” The pink puff ball said. The fox like pokemon looked at him, blushing deeply as she had been caught red-pawed. “Anyways! I think you two want to make an exploration team right?” He asked.

Eric looked at him, surprised. “How did you know?” He asked. Wigglytuff snickered. “

Well, to be honest, that's the only reason someone other than Chatot comes in here. They don't even drop by to say hello sometimes. It's either making a team, or trying to sell me something when they give Chatot the slip.”

Chatot frowned. “Guildmaster! Don't say those kind of things! I think we should focus on the matter at hand here, not how I watch for every single pokemon that wants to sell us something!” Eric couldn't help but smirk, and Eevee had to hold in a laugh.

“Well... I guess Chatot is right after all... So let's get down right to business shall we? First of all, we need a name for your team. Which one do you want?” The guildmaster got a bit more serious now.

Eric was caught off guard by the question. “Umm…” He looked at Eevee nervously. “Do you have an ideas?” He whispered to her.

She leaned closer to him. “I've got a name I've been thinking for a long time... but promise you won't laugh ok?” He nodded. She leaned closer and whispered something. Eric listened and once she finished he looked at her, his face showing confusion and asked if she was actually serious about this. She nodded, blushing.

“You guys have a name?” Chatot hurried them. Eric turned to look at him and nodded slowly.

“Yeah... Our team name is…” He breathed in deeply. ‘This is gonna be weird…’ He thought. “Our team name is Team Pokepals.” He said awkwardly. He could've sworn he had heard Chatot snickering. He looked at him, his eyes showing a ‘I'm going to murder you if you laugh’ look. Chatot's face went blank again.

Wigglytuff coughed, calling to order, and all three pokémon in the room faced him. “Team Pokepals? Is that your answer? Decide wisely, since you won't be able to change it until you pass your guild training.” Both Eric and Eevee looked at eachother and then looked at the guildmaster. They both nodded. “Alright then... It's set!” He rose from the ground and held his arms up “YOOOOOOOOM-TA” He shouted all of a sudden. For a second, it felt like he rose a gust of wind, since they both felt some kind of force coming from him. ”From now on, I declare you members of Team Pokepals!” He went to one of chests in the back and grabbed a small golden box. “You may now open this box and look at it's contents!” He shouted.

Eric and Eevee walked up to the box and opened it.

Inside, they found a pair of badges with the official Exploration Team emblem and the words ‘Members of Wigglytuff’s Guild: Normal Rank’ engraved on the back.  Eric was about to ask what “Normal Rank” meant when he was interrupted by one of the loudest squeals he had ever heard, which came from Eevee, who had been looking through the box. “Oh my god a Wonder Map! And there's also a Treasure Bag!” She shouted, pulling out what seemed to be a sheet of paper and a bag. The bag seemed to contain something, and Eevee opened it. “Oh! Scarves?” She said, pulling them out. They were black, and for just a second her eyes went wide and then immediately looked away. “Uh... I don't really like the color…” She said, which made everyone look at her, interested.

Nevertheless, Eric looked at them and didn’t press on the issue. “Well... for a scarf it doesn't really suit... Guess we'll dye them.” He looked at the bag and also found two spheres on small golden pins. “What are these?” He asked. Chatot approached him and explained them as “light orbs”.

“You can use them to see in the darkness. Just pin them to whatever you’re wearing, and turn them to the right and they’ll light up, and if you want to go into hiding turn them off by twisting left. Really nifty things, and they cost an arm and a leg, so take care of them!” Chatot quickly explained, then walked over to the side of the room and grabbed a bright magenta crystal. Eevee gasped.

“Oh my gosh, it’s a Resonance Crystal!” She screamed, and Eric looked at her weird while Chatot and Wigglytuff were discussing something. “They’re new artifacts that are being created and given to the most important guilds in the region… with a powerful psychic type, they allow for communication between other crystals of the same vein, so they can communicate with the main base of the ETF!” Now everyone is looking at her as she keeps rambling on. Once she notices that everyone’s eyes are on her though, she stops and gives sheepish smile. “Basically, they can communicate with the Exploration Team Federation with those… which is super neat and cool.”

After all this lengthy explanation, they put everything inside the Treasure Bag. Chatot coughed, calling their attention. He looked at Eric. “Alright... now... since you don't remember if you even have a home and…” He looked at Eevee. “I don't even know where you live, I am pretty sure it would be best for both of you to stay in the guild. Is this ok?” They both nodded. “Good. However… Since we are really short on space, we only have one empty bedroom. Usually we would divide the guildmembers into female and male bedrooms. However, since there's only one, as I've stated before…” He looked at both of them. “You'll have to share the room.” It felt like a bucket of cold water washed over both their heads.

“Excuse me?!” Eevee shouted suddenly. “I am going to have to share a bedroom with him?!” Eric was taken aback by this reaction.

“What? Something wrong with it?” Eevee stared at him, showing her teeth to him and blushing at the same time.

“Well I just met you today you dummy! It's kind of awkward to sleep in the same bedroom with a complete stranger don't you think?”

Eric walked closer to her. “A complete stranger which saved you and helped you!”

Eevee inched closer to him. “Yet he didn't even hesitate to blame me for breaking into the guild!” Their faces got closer and closer the louder they shouted.

“You seconded that motion!”

“But it was your idea!”

“You didn’t have problem with it back then!”  
  
“You got us in trouble!”  
  
“And it eventually lead to this moment! It all worked out perfectly!”  
  
“And now I have to sleep with you because of it!” Their faces were extremely close at this point.

“ **Stop it already you two!** ” Chatot shouted. They both immediately stopped arguing to look at the other pokemon in the room. Wigglytuff and Chatot were staring at them, both really confused. “What was that about meeting just today and saving lives?! What in the world happened to you two?! Explain yourselves, immediately!” Eric and Eevee looked at eachother and gathered their thoughts. After this, they proceeded to explain how they had met, what had happened on the beach, and how they had gotten to the guild. “And all that happened today?” Chatot asked once they both finished explaining.

They nodded. Wigglytuff huffed. “Wow... you two had a really busy day... I think you deserve a good dinner and some well earned rest.” He looked out the window. “However, it's gotten pretty late... So you'll have to do with some apples and berries. Your room is the one at the end of the hall to the left of here.” He looked at Chatot. “Call Chimecho and tell her to take out some supplies for a quick dinner. Also, tell the other members.” Chatot nodded, as he turned around and opened the door, heading out.

“ **GUILDMEMBERS! ASSEMBLE!** ”

He didn't get any answer however, just silence. He called everyone again, but got no result. “Um... Chatot... Where are the guildmembers?” Eric asked.

Chatot closed his eyes, trying to remember. “Well... Diglett came to warn us in treasure town and right afterwards we came to the guild running. A few minutes later I went down the stairs and the others…” He opened his eyes in pure shock. “The others…” His face turned into one of horror. “ **Squawk!** They are outside!” He shouted. He zipped away, while at the same time Wigglytuff had been saying something related to apples and how good they were, and he was right now dancing with an apple on top of his head. Just outside the guild, Chatot found the starving and freezing guildmembers. From the bottom floor of the guild, the duo could hear them shouting angrily and the bird.

Eric stared at Wigglytuff, and then looked at the stairs, where the shouts were coming from. He sighed. “This is going to be one hell of a ride isn't it…” He said. Eevee felt the same way he did, sighing as well.

“Yeah…”

* * *

 

After all of what happened on the day, Eric and Eevee finally got to their bedroom. It wasn't really big, which only made matters worst. It was a round chamber, which was blocked from the rest of the hallway by a wooden door. There was a bucket of water, a window on the wall where they could the moon shining on the sky, and, fortunately, two straw beds, which were in fact, pretty close together. This was easily fixed, as they both immediately grabbed their respective beds and pulled them away into the opposite sides of the room. The both dropped to the beds and closed their eyes, really mad at eachother. After a few minutes of moving around uncomfortably in their beds however, they began calming down, and soon realizing they had both been idiots. Eevee turned around to look at Eric, just to notice he was staring at her too. From the other side of them room of course, but still, staring at her.

 

([Goodnight – Pokémon Mystery Dungeon](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmmE5rtRtbc))

 

“Hey... um... I wanted to say... I'm sorry for getting mad with you earlier. It was true yeah... It was my idea to come down here without knowing, so we could've ended up in a lot of trouble. I didn't really think that one trough…” He remained silent after that, and because of this he heard her chuckle.

“Yeah. You weren't too clever back there. Though... If you hadn't done that we wouldn't have ended up here... And if I have to be completely honest... Only good stuff has happened to me since I met you.”

He smiled. “Yeah. That's why they call me ‘Mr. Walking Good Luck Charm’. I have so much good luck I lose my memory and wake up in a beach.” They both laughed at that. Though it wasn't really really funny, it was ironic that although he had probably had a really bad day, it still felt like a dream for Eevee.

“I still can't believe it though... Finally! I'm part of an exploration team! And... it's all thanks to you really. I kind of think I was ungrateful.”

He shook his head. “Nah. We were just being idiots.” They laid there silent for a few minutes. “You know... I am kind of surprised that you even agreed to... you know. Make a team. I had expected you would refuse, since I thought you would probably try and find more answers to your past. But…” She smiled warmly at him. “I am glad you decided to stay with me. As cheesy as that sounds, it's true.”

He smiled, but in his mind he had a good reason. ‘I can’t tell her but… if there’s any good reason I decided to form a team with you it’s because I feel bad for what happened earlier… you could barely hold your own in that battle, and I’d feel horrible if something were to happen to you now, so… Yeah, but I can’t tell her that.’. Because of these thoughts, he quickly came up with a more… sensible response. “Well... me staying here doesn't mean I don't want answers. It's bugging me a lot you know. Who was I? Where did I come from? How did I end up in that beach and why did I lose my memories? There's so many questions…” He trailed off with more ‘What ifs’ and theories.

She chuckled. “Well, lying on your bed wondering about isn't going to solve anything at all. Let's just go to sleep and we'll figure it out some other day. Tomorrow... Tomorrow's the big day! Goodnight Eric.” She said.

“Goodnight Eevee.” He answered. Eevee curled up in a ball position, with her tail on top of her body, while Eric laid on his bed. He put his arms under his head, like they were a cushion and closed his eyes. Slowly, they both drifted off to sleep, a smile on her face and a slighy frown on his’.

 

( **Stop the music** )

 

And it was on that fateful day... That day when it all began. The beach at dusk where they met, that shake of hands where they became friends, and that "good night" filled with kindness started it all. On that fateful day, two young pokemon sealed their fates, and begun the greatest adventure to have ever been told in that world. It was, on that fateful day, when they first met. And it was a day, that neither of them would forget.

* * *

([Zant's Theme – The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_6PunpVxZw))

 

The hall was in complete silence, not a single soul could be heard, only the irregular breathing of those there. Only five shapes were visible, three of which were standing near a fourth one, kneeling in front of a throne where another was calmly sitting on. There was an air of oppression and fear lingering in the air, but also admiration and in some cases devotion. The kneeling figure slowly rose its head, taking a deep breath.

“In the name of the Master of Darkness and Reincarnation Giratina… I, Petrae, formerly known as Allister the Golem, swear my eternal loyalty to my master, who pulled me out of the dark corners of this world and into the realm of enlightenment and truth, and reared me toward a better world and future for all.” The shapes standing around him whispered softly, and the Golem merely glanced at them from the corner of his eye, seeing a small fin covering a beak as a female chuckled.

The one in the seat rose a limb, and the whispering and chuckling ceased, everyone waiting for their master’s words. “Good… The time has come, Petrae, for you to finally become part of something much bigger than yourself… You have sworn your undying loyalty to me, and from no on, you will serve my purpose, which is your purpose too: a new world, cleansed of all the malice and filth that plagues this one. You wish for a world where the strong, the ones that are truly strong, both in mind and body, will thrive above the weak, who will famish at their feet and plead for whatever leftovers fall from the shoulders of giants.” Petrae nodded with every word, and stood up as he became enthralled by his words. The figure in the throne smiled.

“Yes… you will do perfectly… Petrae.” He repeated.

 

( **Stop the music** )

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that marks the beggining of the actual adventure! Nothing too different from the original story line, I know... but back then I was really insecure and thought that if I diverged from the main story too much nobody would bother to read my fic... turns out I was wrong.
> 
> Either way, the next few chapters are much shorter than both the Prologue and this one, and from Chapter 6 the length of the chapters will go up slowly until we come back to 10k+. To anyone who has actually stuck around so far, thank you very much again, and I'll see you next time!
> 
> PS: Expect me to upload chapters once a week, either tuesday or wednesday. Not making any huge promises though.


	3. Chapter 2 - The Worst Alarm Clock

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rise and shine to the dawn of a new life, and face the dangers that lie ahead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello again! Sorry this took forever to come out, was kinda busy with exams and all, but... now that it's summer, I'll try to make these releases a bit more regular. Shorter chapter this time around (back when I was first writing, this batch came out in like a day... It's something I'm personally ashamed of). Anyways, enjoy and I'll see you shortly!

**Chapter 2**

**–**

**Worst Alarm Clock**

 

_“Run Elly! Run!” She heard. Once again... the screams plagued her dreams, didn't let her rest... Her sleep was only suffering for her, and didn't get much rest at all. They gave her back memories... And they came every single night... Every single day... Some might think she could go insane. She didn't blame them for thinking like that... She hadn't had any childhood what so ever, and it had only showed her that she had to stay strong, even if she was too scared. However, there was still one thing that terrified her to no end. And that was_ **_her_ ** _corpse, staring at her with blank eyes._

Eevee abruptly woke up from the nightmare, yelping. It wasn't really loud, so she didn't expect anyone to wake up. After about ten years... She still hadn't gotten used to them. She was panting heavily, sweat trickling down her fur. She stared out the window and into the pure white moon, shining still high up in the sky. She guessed it was going to be another sleepless night. She decided to settle in then, as she curled up once again. She closed her eyes in hopes of resting for a bit. She actually enjoyed it. Not sleeping through the night or the nightmares of course, but actually just closing her eyes and... listening. Or feeling the cool breezes sway her fur, giving her a refreshing sensation. However, she wasn't in her cave, so she couldn't feel any wind.

* * *

 

However, she did hear something. Mumbling. And it was really close. She opened her eyes, and looked around, scared. Was there someone in the bedroom with her? She suddenly remembered that there was someone in there with her. It was Eric. The riolu she had met that very day and was sleeping in the same bedroom as her due to some space problems in the guild. It wasn't a problem for neither of them, since they had sorted it out and they had gone to opposite sides of the bedroom. However, she found him laying right in the middle, laying on the cold stone floor, moving around and mumbling. She looked at him, confused and worried. Was something wrong with him? Was he just having a nightmare? She stared at him for a while, and wondered just what was wrong.

* * *

 

_He woke up all of a sudden. He felt something was wrong, which was made worse by a cold chill that went up his spine. He was covered by some thick blankets with sailor and ship designs on them. His bed was cozy and warm, but even in there, he still felt like the house was freezing. He opened his eyes and looked around. His bedroom wasn't very big. The ceiling was white, with a light bulb in the center, the floor covered by a carpet with a starry pattern, which matched the one of his pajamas. Next to him there was a teddy bear. He looked at the window to see if her mom had left it open, but to his surprise, he found it was closed, as the curtains that covered it weren't swaying. He looked at his bedroom door and noticed it wasn't open either, though he could see lights coming from under the door. He suddenly heard a shout, which he instantly recognized._

_“Dad?” He asked into the darkness. He got no response. He decided to go down there and see what was going on. Maybe his dad had fallen off the stairs again while going to the kitchen to get a glass of water. He removed the sheets and shifted himself to the edge of the bed. It wasn't necessarily high, though he didn't quite reach the bottom. Because of this, he had to drop down a few inches. He started walking towards the door slowly, almost tripping on some of the toys in the way, since he hadn't picked them up that night after playing with his father. His mother was going to be mad with him the next morning. He got up to the door and looked through the keyhole. The hallway was pitch black except at the end, where the stairs were, lights coming from downstairs._

_He reached out to the knob and grabbed it with both of his hands, twisting it to the right. The door slowly opened because of his weight. He let go of it and grabbed the door, pulling backwards and opening it. He walked down the hallway and got to the stairs. He saw different colored lights coming from downstairs. He started walking down the stairs, looking through the bars to see if he saw something. He saw the living room door cracked open. He finished walking down the wooden steps, and then he felt a cold gust of wind. Just then, a pain filled growl was heard, followed by a loud thud and sounds of running and slamming. Another shout was heard coming from the room, this time it was a woman's. “_ **_No!”_ ** _He heard the woman shout._

_Eric froze. “Mommy?” He asked, startled. He rushed to the door, though stopping on his tracks when he saw the main door of the house busted, lying on the floor in front of the main hallway._

_Another scream was heard, and he recognized it as her mother's, though this time is was filled with pain and sadness, and he also heard sobbing._

_Another scream and he heard gurgling, as another loud thud was heard through the house. “Mom?!” Eric rushed in the living room, and witnessed what scarred him for life. In front of the door, and trying to reach out for the door, was her mother's corpse, which head icicles piercing through her neck, her eyes wide open and... and staring right at him. Though his first instinct should've been to scream uncontrollably, or cry or just faint, he rushed up to her mother. “MOM!” He grabbed her by the neck, careful to not stab himself with the icicles. “_ **_MOMMY!_ ** _” Tears were beginning to appear on his face, as he hugged her mother's lifeless body._

_Soon however, it went from warm to ice cold. He separated himself quickly just to see how her mother's body turned into hard ice. “_ **_MOM!”_ ** _He desperately cried, high pitched voice resonating all over the house, tears coming down his face and snot coming down pouring from his nose. Slamming his fists on the ice sculpture that used to be his mom. He stared at it, his vision blurry because of the tears. Thoughts of fear, panic and immense sadness filled him, as he felt a pressure in his chest building up. He screamed out, trying to get that feeling out of his heart, sobbing because of his loss. And he hadn't even noticed his father's body lying a bit further. When he did notice it however, he saw a tall slender figure standing right next to him. It was taller than the lamp that was knocked over at the corner of the room. Of course, as he remembered it. The damn thing was even taller than his father, and he was about 1.85, so he supposed that it was about 2 meters or more tall. It had bright blue eyes that sent chills up him, freezing his body in place, as well as his view, as he still stared at it's eyes._

_He was afraid too, beyond any reasonable measure. “No… no no no… why would you…” He stared at the mother’s corpse. “_ **_Why?!_ ** _You knew this would happen!” Eric stared at him. It's voice was grave, so it had to be a man. He wanted to speak, but he couldn't utter a word. He was too scared. The tall man looked at him, still smiling. “My original mission was to kill them both because of betrayal... But…” He sighed, then smirked, feeling lucky that he had found the child. “I guess I can get rid of such an abomination as well…” He started approaching him menacingly. An icicle appeared in his hands, and it grew out to some kind of weapon, whose head was half a pickaxe and half an axe. Eric immediately knew what to do. He turned on a dime and began running out of the living room, almost tripping on the ice sculpture. He felt like his world his literally spinning, and everything after that was a blur to him._

_He got out of the room, running down the hallway to the main entrance. He heard the man's weapon flying through the air behind him. He looked behind to see the pickaxe stuck in the wall in front of the door. He looked in front of him again, and ran as fast as his legs would let him. He passed in front of the kitchen door and saw, in shock and in pure utter horror, as the man was already there, waiting for him to go in front of him. He brought down his weapon right as he went through, the axe part trying to cut him in half. He managed to quick step to the left, slamming into the wall and dodging the axe, but couldn't dodge it completely, as the axe cut his right arm, scratching his arm in the process, blood coming out from it. Eric fell to the ground because of the pain and looked at his arm. The pajamas were cut, and showed a bright red slash that went from his shoulder to the middle of his arm. He got up quickly and rushed to the door, which was extremely close to him at that moment._

_However, when he was about to cross and get out of the house, a wall of ice rose and blocked his way completely. He turned around and saw the thin man, who was slowly walking up to him, a wicked smile on his face and his blue eyes staring at him. Eric tried to back away into the wall of ice, crying and sobbing. “No... please…” He pleaded. The man just stared at him. He rose his weapon and smiled again._

_“No.”_

_Then, he brought it down. He screamed in fear._

_Everything went black. A really high pitched noise was heard, and his head hurt a lot. “Eric…” He heard a voice call him. “Eric…” The voice was louder now. “ERIC!” The high pitched noise increased, digging into his eardrums and everything went white, managing to catch the faint outline of a young human with blond hair smiling._

_Wait…_

_Human?_

* * *

 

Eric shouted and opened his eyes, startled. He incorporated himself, sitting on the floor. He looked around. He was back in the guild, in the stone room where he had gone to sleep the last night. Next to him was his companion, Eevee, who was looking at him really worried. “Eric what's wrong?” She asked. He was panting heavily, his fur looked like a mess and there was sweat all over him.

His eyes were wide open, and he felt adrenaline coursing through his veins. “I... I just had a nightmare... nothing else.” His voice sounded much more deep than usual.

“Yeah. You don't say. Just what kind of nightmare was that?” She asked. He looked at her, worried. “What do you mean?” The riolu asked, raising an eyebrow.

Her face grew even more worried. “You were screaming like someone was chopping you in half. Also, look at you! You look like someone just chased you!” She said. Though they were shouting, they were careful enough to not scream to loud, so they didn't wake up the other members.

Eric got aggressive all of a sudden, like he was trying to protect something. “I'm alright ok? Just leave me the hell alone!” He said, clearly not in the mood for her worries. Eevee backed away. He dropped on his bed again and closed his eyes.

Eevee huffed. “Unbelievable jerk... I'm trying to help you!" She walked up to her bed like a hurricane and dropped on it. She closed her eyes and kept insulting the riolu in the same room mentally. However, after a while she heard him speak.

“It's not like I don't want to tell you... It's just... that I don't even know what it was, Eevee.” She relaxed as she heard this. She turned around to face him, but he was still looking away.

She smiled warmly. “Nightmares are just that. You don't really get them, but you know if they were a nightmare or not. They usually don't make sense at first but... if you think about it they actually relate something bad that's happened to you. Maybe recently, maybe a long time ago…”

It was then that he turned around and looked at her. “That's the problem. I don't remember. And since I have no memories, and nightmares are supposed to be me reliving those memories…” And then it all suddenly made sense to her. She knew what he meant! He thought it was a flashback! Something that had happened to him! In other words: he was recovering his memories!

“If I’m understanding this correctly, then you think you're recovering your memories right?” He lowered his vision, not looking to convinced. “What is it?” She showed her concern for his state, and he looked up.

”Well... in the dream, nightmare, flashback or whatever you called it... I wasn't myself.” She rose an eyebrow, and he sighed as he couldn’t find a better way to express himself. He sighed. “In the dream, I was a strange creature, not a Riolu. I was about as tall as I was now, but I was wearing some kind of clothes. I had two legs and two arms, but they didn't end in paws. They ended in hands with five fingers, and none of the parts of my body that I saw were covered in fur. “ While he described the creature, Eevee's face slowly turned paler and paler.

“Eric…” She interrupted him while he was narrating him his nightmare. “The creatures you're describing me... they are humans.”

Eric stared at her, confused. “Humans?” The word sounded familiar. All of a sudden, the same image he saw before he blacked out in the beach flashed in front of his eyes, and then the one he had just seen, the word finally setting down. “Humans! Yeah! Now I remember! I am a human!” He shouted, raising from the bed. An awkward silence rose between them. Eric suddenly noticed something. “Wait... But.. If I am supposed to be a human, then why am I a Riolu?” He asked. He wasn't asking Eevee, or no one in special. He was asking himself. Why was he a riolu, if he felt, if he remembered he was a human?

“Eric... you're messing with me aren't you?” He stared at her.

“Uuuuh… no, I’m not. Why? What do you mean?”

“Eric... humans don't exist. They are legends.” His jaw dropped to the floor, beyond surprised. “Yeah. Humans supposedly lived in this land a really long time ago, since records of them have been found in ancient caves. They were great warriors of the past that appeared to influence in the tides of many wars, most importantly in the Dark Days.” Eric looked at her. He didn't understand what she was saying at all. “However... I am... really into this sort of stuff. I really like this whole legends and forgotten lands thing. Because of this, I think that humans existed back then, and since there's no reason for humans to completely disappear... I believe they are still out there, hiding. This world is very big... So who says they aren't here still?” She said.

“So... You believe me?” He asked.

She nodded. “Yeah. I have to believe you. We are partners now. If we are going to be a great exploration team and find out your past... Then we need to know eachother very well. After all we are going to see eachother everyday, work together and... apparently sleep together.” He looked at her, raising an eyebrow. She blushed under her brown fur and shook her paws in front of her. “I mean in the same bedroom! I don't think we'll ever get to sleep in the same bed together!”

He rolled his eyes. “I didn't even say anything really, you were the one that started saying those things.” She glared daggers at him, as he gave him the dumbest smirk he could do.

“Well... I think we should go back to sleeping, because tomorrow morning we are going to be beat.” He said. She nodded. They both returned to their beds and went to sleep. However, none of them slept really well the rest of that night.

* * *

 

“ **WAKE UP YOU SLEEPHEADS!** ” Someone shouted. Eric and Eevee shot up, waking up instantly, both of them startled by the sudden shout. “ **HURRY UP OR YOU'RE GOING TO BE LATE!** ” The voice sounded again.

"Arceus his voice is so loud! Who was that?!" Eric asked himself. He opened his eyes and looked, just to see the door slamming behind whoever had woken them up. Eric felt like his head was about to explode. He looked around, though it was hard because his vision was a bit blurry. He finally distinguished a brown figure stumbling around. It had to be Eevee. He groaned in pain because of the massive headache that guy had gotten him. “God damn... That guy almost blew my head up…”

She groaned even louder. “Well he popped my ears because I can't hear anything!” Once his vision became clear, he noticed how mad Eevee actually was.

“I am going to take that you hate being woken up really early…” He said.

She looked at him. “As well as having my freaking ears destroyed! Sweet Arceus how loud can a pokemon be?!” She shouted. They complained for a while about someone who wasn't even in that room. After a while, they decided to get out of the room and go to the main room of the guild. They saw all of the members there lined up and waiting for something. One of the pokemon in the ranks turned around and looked at them.

“YOU ARE LATE!” He shouted. They both instantly recognized the voice, the tone, and the loudness. Eric looked at him, glaring daggers.

“Was it you who shouted us up?!” He asked, shouting and obviously really mad.

He nodded. “Yeah, I am Loudred and I am the responsible of waking the guildmembers UP!” He shouted the last word for some reason. He adopted some kind of cool pose, raising a thumb, thinking that he was important.

Everyone in the guild was staring at him, though only Chatot managed to express everyone's feelings. “Loudred! You are obnoxiously loud! Shut up!” He shouted. He instantly closed his huge maw and didn't pronounce a single word. Eric knew that it could've probably been Chatot's scolding, but maybe the death glare that Eevee had given him probably did the rest of the job, since he got really nervous each time he got close to her.

Chatot coughed, calling everyone's attention. “Well... Now that you've arrived we shall wait for the guildmaster, who should be coming out anytime soon…” They all looked at the door for two minutes straight. “Ummm... Any second now…” Chatot said again. Another minute later he knocked on the door. A loud crash was heard from inside, and lots of things rolling open the floor. Everyone looked at eachother, some of them a wide smile on their faces, while others showing pure confusion. Finally, sloppy and slow steps were heard from the other side of the door and it finally opened, the guildmaster walking out slowly after. “Guildmaster! You have arrived! Now that you're here, we shall present the new guildmembers!” Chatot told him. However, Wigglytuff didn't move a muscle. He was breathing alright, but there was something wrong with him.

Eric took little time to notice. “Oh for the love of…” He said, face palming. Eevee looked at him, and he pointed a Wigglytuff with his other hand, the right one still covering his face.

Eevee looked at the guildmaster's eyes and saw that they were in fact, closed. She soon heard his snoring. She had to repress her laugh. “Really?! He's sleeping?!” She whispered Eric. He leaned to her.

“Apparently, and I think we aren't the only ones who have noticed.” He said, pointing his finger at the other guildmembers, who were either whispering between them or giggling. The riolu sighed. “Man, if they didn't give a bad enough image yesterday... Now this is just amazing…” He said, feeling a bit uneasy. Wigglytuff suddenly snapped out of his sleep and looked at all the guildmembers.

“As Chatot was saying, now we must introduce our newest members!” Both of them looked at eachother confused. How had Wigglytuff listened to what Chatot had said while he was sleeping, but they weren't going to question it.

They walked in front of everyone. “These are the newest additions to the guild. Eevee and Eric the Riolu.” Wigglytuff said.

Everyone looked at Eric. “Wait. That's your real name?!” Loudred asked in his permanently loud and obnoxious voice, and he simply nodded back, wincing at the sheer intensity of his shouting.

“What?! Don't you know about those identity thieves?!” Another one shouted. This time it was a Bidoof. He looked like a small rodent, with two huge teeth. His fur was brown and had two ears on top of his head. He had some kind of fir tufts on it's face, surrounding it. He had a red nose and a black snout. The part of his face that surrounded his eyes, as well as his underbelly had a much more paler than the rest of his fur. His arms and legs ended in black webbed paws.

“Well... I actually heard of them yesterday.” His explanation didn’t really help his situation, and only helped to confuse everyone further.

Eevee jumped in the middle of the conversation. “It's not like he didn't know. It's probably because he didn't remember, so let’s ju-”

“How can you forget criminals like those?! That’s like, the stuff you’re **not** supposed to forget!” He cut the Eevee off, raising an eyebrow, as he didn’t like the situation at all.

Chatot walked up in front of him. “Amnesia.” Everyone went silent and stared at the riolu.

“Yeah. I happen to have amnesia. I can't remember anything about my past. Neither where I come from, or how I got there. In fact, I don't even know if Eric's my real name, and no one seems to recognize in town… so as far as I know I could be the only survivor from an accident that happened during the storm the other day or just some traveller who fell and hit his head really hard and can’t go back home.” Eric gave it to them all straight, making sure that the severity of his situation was known. No one answered. They weren't looking at him anymore.

“Damn... that sounds... rough… Sorry for grilling you about it so much.” Loudred said in an unusually low voice. Everyone followed by saying yeah or nodding.

Eric smiled. “It’s alright, it’s only natural that if a guy who shows up at random in a climate like this and makes those wild claims you’re not exactly going to trust him at first. Though… it makes me feel a bit better that you feel sorry about it. Now, if only you could apologize for almost blowing our eardrums off with your voice…” His sudden comeback triggered collective laughter, and Loudred only shot an angry glance at the Riolu, though he kinda did deserve that. “However that's not the end of the story. After that, we got jumped on by two goons in the Beach Cave.” The Riolu added a bit later, then looked at Eevee. “I think you can continue it?” He asked her.

She nodded. “He fought them off and I asked him if he could join a team with me. After that we came to get guild, which was apparently empty and... you know the rest.” She finished.

They could both see that the rest of the members were quite embarrassed. “It was a mistake on my part actually. I just warned the other members while I thought you guys were criminals.” The voice came from a brown pokemon who was half buried in the earth. The pokemon smiled. “Sorry that I didn’t introduce myself earlier: I'm Digglett! I take care of the sentry duty, and Loudred helps me from time to time.”

Eevee stared at him. “Sentry duty?”

Loudred looked at her and coughed, as if trying to look smart. “You may have noticed the grate just outside right? Well, that is covering a hole, in the bottom of which Digglett is. He stares at the grate and when someone steps on it, he identifies the newcomer by it's footprint. Then I open the door if the newcomer is trustworthy or not.”

Eevee's eyes widened. “So that's what it's for! That's a pretty clever system.” ‘ _And also a fantastic way of truly making me feel like a dunce for thinking that took straight to a death trap or something…_ ’ She of course could never share that thought with anyone present, so she just kept it to herself as Diglett kept explaining.

“... and after that, my father came up with it.” Eric nodded as the ground type finished the story.

“That explains the why of such a convoluted system… Don’t you think, Elly?” She snapped out of her thoughts, startled, then looked at him and nodded repeatedly. “Well… that’s over with, now... I don't know any of you guys.” The pokemon that had been looking at him walked forward.

“Oh my gosh… Ok, so, I guess we should like... introduce ourselves. My name is Sunflora. “Said the first pokemon. She was literally a walking plant. A sunflower to be exact. It's whole body was green except for the head. Her arms were leafs. Her head looked like a sunflower's, however, it was white instead of black, and she had two eyes and a mouth. Aside from that, the resemblance to a sunflower was shocking. “That's Chimecho. She’s a real sweetheart, and a mean cook too.” She pointed at yet another weird creature. Chimecho was a floating white head with red patterns on it's sides, as well as two little arms and a small tail in her back. There was a yellow bell shape on her head and a long tail that ended in red color, which came from the bottom of her main body.

“Hiii!” She cheerfully shouted, and the newcomers returned the greeting. “Yeaaah, I run the infirmary and I also cook, so… you better not anger me or you’ll be skipping dinner!” This last thing she said felt like an actual threat, so the duo nodded. Once that was over with, she turned to look at the two others. “Those are Dugtrio and Corpish. “ He looked at the two pokemon Sunflora told him. Dugtrio was just like Diglett, but seemed to have three heads instead of one, as well as being considerably bigger than the previously said.

Corpish looked a lot like a river crab. It had six orange legs, which connected with his under belly. His head and the back of his body was covered by a red shell. There were three spikes on top of his head, really close to his eyes. He also had two really big pincers. Half of them were cream colored, and the other was red. "Hey, Hey! How's it goin'?” Corpish said. Dugtrio looked at them and moved one of his heads, but didn't utter any words.

Sunflora pointed at the last pokemon. “And that's Croagunk.” She leaned closer to him. “He doesn't speak often, but ready for when you do… you’ll be surprised.” She whispered.

Eric looked at the one called Croagunk. He was a dark blue frog which stood on two legs. He had yellow eyes, surrounded by black markings. His cheeks were orange and they were expendable, and he was smiling as well. His teeth were really white. There was a black marking which encircled his upper arms and his chest, as well as two white bands around it too. It had three fingers and three toes in his arms and legs respectively, though the middle finger on his hands were orange. As Sunflora said, he didn't even say hi, but just glanced at the two newcomers while he leaned against his huge clay pot… which seemed to serve no purpose other than looks, as it was empty.

Those seemed to be all of the guildmembers present at that moment. After talking for a while, Wigglytuff and Chatot called everyone. “Well, now that you've gotten you know eachother, we must proceed to the normal routine!” Everyone looked at him and nodded. They all lined up. “Alright pokemon! Let's do it!” Chatot shouted. Suddenly, the members burst into a chant which they had all memorized by heart.

“ONE! DON'T SHIRK WORK! TWO! RUN AWAY AND PAY! THREE! SMILES GO FOR MILES!” They all shouted in unison. “Alright pokemon! Let's get to work!” Chatot followed. Everyone cheered and the formation broke, everyone going to their respective posts.

Eric just stared at the formation. “Umm... So what was that for?” He asked Chatot as he approached him.

“Well, that's our morning routine chant! After waking up all the guildmembers, we recite the chant and the day officially starts! Every guild member needs to know it from memory, so you better learn it quick! Now come with me. It's time you two get your first job.” He said. Eric sighed in annoyance. _‘Great... I'm pretty sure that it's going to be most embarrassing time of my life… Which to be fair, has only lasted for two days.’_ Eevee though, was about to burst a vein from the excitement, ignoring the actual chanting for now.

“Our first mission Eric! Oh, what's it going to be?! Maybe an exploration! Are we going to have to trap some criminals? The excitement is killing me!” She shouted as they went up the stairs. Once up there, they noticed Chatot standing next to a bulletin board, waiting for them.

“Good, you're here, let me explain. This is the Job Bulletin’ Board. Here you will be able to pick your missions for the day. Your job will be to accomplish the criteria in the paper, whether it is picking up a lost item, apprehending a criminal and more. Since you two do have some experience from the encounter you say you had yesterday, I think we are going to skip the introduction and jump into real missions. Who was the team leader? I don't remember.” He asked them. Eric and Eevee looked at eachother.

“Umm... I don’t think we settled on it yesterday... Eric do you want to be the leader?” She almost pleaded, and he only gave her a grave look.

“Can’t we just share the title? I mean, we both founded the team, so why do I have to be the one that takes charge? Heck, it was your idea!” She shook her head, and looked at Chatot nervously, who was looking at them, confused.

“Come over here for a second Eric…” She dragged him away from the bird for a moment with her teeth, which hurt a bit. “I can’t, I just can’t Eric. I’m scared beyond belief of taking control of our decisions and messing everything up…” She looked away. “Besides, you’re way braver than I am, so you’ll probably make better decisions than I’ll ever do.” She didn’t sound too confident in her own skills, but Eric wasn’t about to force her, though this confirmed his worries: she wasn’t going to be of too much help with both that attitude and cowardice.

“Alright then, I’ll do it…” He looked at Chatot. “We’ve decided, I’ll be leader.” He said, approaching the bulletin board. Eric looked around the many papers on the board. They were all very well written. However, one of them called his attention. It was located to the left of the board. He grabbed it and read it. “To whoever is reading this…”

 

" _To whoever is reading this:_

_Please help me. A really good friend of mine is stuck inside the Drenched Bluff and I can't get to him. Please, you must rescue him or I fear the worst could happen. Bring your best team. There's something extremely dangerous in the cave..._

_Chimchar._

 

“Whoa. Something extremely dangerous in Drenched Bluff? That’s a first… Kids probably.” Eevee said.

Eric looked at her. “Well... from the style of writing I would say that they aren’t necessarily young... and it's very formal as well…”

Chatot shook his head. “It isn't because of the writing. It's because of the place. Drenched Bluff is not really far away from here, and the strongest pokemon you'll find there will be Chinglings, which aren't much of a challenge.”

Chimecho, who was floating by overheard this and stared down the bird. “What did you say?!” She shouted.

Chatot backed away. “Nothing! What do you mean?!” He asked, pretty worried of what the psychic type might do.

“Mmmmmmmmmmmmh?! What’s what, Chatot, you’re saying that today you’ll have to pass up on dinner?! Oh that’s such a shame, I’ll just have to split your food across everyone else…” He started complaining, trying to get away from the sticky situation he had gotten himself into.Eric didn't understand what was going on, though Eevee found it really funny.

She explained to him that Chimecho is the evolution of Chingling. Eevee also had to describe what evolution was, and when he comprehended the whole situation, he found it hilarious. Though he managed to not laugh of course. He didn't know what Chatot could be capable of. After a while, Chimecho floated away, and Chatot sighed in relief. “As I was saying... there aren't really powerful pokemon there, and only a kid who still hasn't got a hang of fighting could consider that place extremely dangerous.” Eevee snickered.

“I've sometimes gone there alone, trying to have a bit of a adventure. Nothing too impressive, though the deeper you go the less paths there are. It's strange for being a normal cave, and I always end up in the same room. I think I have a map back at my place…”

Chatot dismissed her worries with his wing. “You won't need it. He can't be that far away from the entrance. This one will be really easy. Also look at the rewards!” Chatot said, pointing at the numbers under the actual letter.

Eric read them. “Reward: 5000 poke.”

Eevee's eyes almost popped from their sockets. “ **5000?! What?!** ” She shouted. She grabbed the letter from Eric's paws and read it. After finishing it she read it again, and one more time after that just in case. “Who are their parents?”

Chatot shrugged. “I don't know, but they must be ‘loaded’, as you kids put it these days, because that is an absurd amount of money for just getting a kid out of Drenched Bluff. But I think that's the least important thing for you right?”

She nodded. “Yeah. Even if it was less than half the money, I'd still do it. They need help urgently, and we need to help them. That is our work!” She shouted, motivated. Chatot smiled. Her motivation was contagious, because Eric just felt excitement running through his body after that. Her drive to help others was extremely contagious.

“Well, we know where to go and what to do! What are we waiting for?! Let's go!” He shouted. They then both ran up the stairs and left the guild in a rush, both of them anxious to begin their first mission.

Chatot smiled after they left. They were young and, even if they said they had an encounter before, really inexperienced. However, they were really motivated, and that was a very important aspect. For at least ten years he had never seen such motivated pokemon. They would surely do a great job. However, he also had to do some work. And it actually had to do with that team. After waiting for a few minutes for Team Pokepals to be long gone, Chatot flew out of the guild and got to treasure town. He flew up to the Kecleon shop. He had seen the Eevee a long time ago, working with the brothers. “Hello!” He said as he flew up to the brothers.

Both of them looked at the bird. “Oh, Mr. Chatot! What a nice surprise! Here to buy provisions? We got a huge bag of fresh Oran Berries this very morning!” The green kecleon said.

Chatot smiled. “Good, I'll buy you some, but later. Right now, I need to make you some questions.” He said. The brothers looked at eachother. “About someone who we believe works or worked here with you. Her name is Eevee”

Both of the brothers stared at him. “Where is she? Did you find her?” They asked, faces full of worry.

“Yes. She is perfectly fine. In fact, yesterday she joined our guild and this morning she has left with her companion. However... she hasn't really revealed much information about her, and... I wanted to ask if you could be give me any information you have.” Both of the brothers looked at eachother again.

* * *

 

Chatot opened Wigglytuff's door and walked in. “Guildmaster I'm back.” The pink furry creature looked at him.

“Good. Did you find any info on them?” He asked. Chatot shook his head.

“No. Nothing at all. The eevee was first seen a few years ago walking around, already working for the kecleon brothers. The brothers say that they found her trying to desperately steal food for them. She was famishing, so they decided to give her food and a bit of money in exchange of helping in the shop. She didn't tell them, since every single time they even told her something related to it, she began crying.” Wigglytuff's face went grim.

“Well... after that I don't know if we should know her past. And what about Eric?” He said, looking out the window.

Chatot sighed, looking in the same direction. “There are rumors about a riolu walking around in the middle of the night about two days ago.” He said. Wigglytuff looked at him.

“The stormy night?”

“Indeed. Some say that he was headed for the Sharpedo Bluff.” Wigglytuff closed his eyes and stood there, thinking.

“The bluff…”He said. He thought about it for a second. “Whatever dark thoughts crossed that young man to the edge, we shall never know. What we know… is that he changed his mind incredibly fast.” Chatot was confused at first, asking his superior and old friend to clarify. “The bluff has lately become a spot for pokémon to end hteir suffering in this world…” Chatot’s eyes widened.

“What?! But… how come we weren’t…”

“We live in dark times my friend. Officer Magnezone will give you more information about the case if you wish to delve further into those details… but the fact stands: for considering ending his life, this Riolu seemed awfully cheerful this morning.” He turned to look at him. “Let’s keep a close eye on him for the time being. If he truly did jump but failed to end his life, that would explain why he’s suddenly amnesiac… and if that is the case him recovering his memories would turn him into a ticking time bomb.”

Chatot was shocked as it all suddenly made sense. The impact with the water could give an explanation to his amnesia, as well as being found in the beach shore. He also remembered Eric saying something about screwing everything up right before he left. “Sweet Arceus... It actually makes sense…”

“Was that all the information you got?” The guildmaster asked.

“Yes. Team Pokepals was sent to a rescue mission to the Drenched Bluff. They should be back in a few hours.”

The pink pokémon frowned. “I've been hearing strange things about Drenched Bluff you know. Large groups of pokemon have been seen there.” He said, a worried look on his face. Chatot snickered. “Large groups of what, Anoriths? Come on, it's not like they've been sent to their early demise. It's just a normal mission, what's the worst that could happen?” He asked sarcastically. Wigglytuff stared at him with his eyes wide open. “Why did y- You do realize you’re only inviting disaster with that question, right?” There was a slight smirk on his face too, confident that there wouldn’t be any issues.

However, they were both wrong, as Loudred suddenly burst into the room, shouting louder than usual. “Guildmaster! There's someone outside asking for you! It's a Chimchar, and she's freaking out about a mission and the new rookies!”

Both of the guild’s superiors exchanged looks of concern, and then turned to Loudred again. “Bring her to this room. Now.” His orders were carried out almost immediately, the serious look on his face telling both of the other pokémon all they needed to know. Seconds later the Chimchar, a normal one, without any special characteristics, walked into the room, glancing at every single thing that surprised or interested her, but doing so with her eyes wide open and hands close together. “Thank you for letting me in. I really need to talk with the guildmaster.” His left foot was tapping on the floor incessantly.

Wigglytuff nodded. “That would be me. Wigglytuff, at your service.” They stretched hands. “Now, what is it that you wished to tell me?”

The chimchar cleared her throat. “About two or three days ago, I put up a letter requesting help from one of your bets teams: my team member, an old friend of mine, and myself, were attacked in Drenched Bluff, and still hasn’t come back.”

Chatot looked at her. “Wait, so you're that Chimchar? But you're an adult! Skilled enough to fight through whatever is in that cave! With how close it is it’d be nearly impossible for such dangerous criminals to sneak in unnoticed!”

Chimchar turned around, worry disappearing and instead replaced by clear as day anger, the temperature in the room rising. “How can you be so sure?! Why don't you try and go to the cave right now instead of basing yourself of something that you experienced a long time ago?!” Her response did make Chatot stumble back, not used to being shouted back. “That cave has changed! It's infested with... something.”

Wigglytuff looked at the chimchar. “Infested is an odd choice of words… What do you mean?”

Her face went grim, growing desperate, words getting stuck in her throat. “I do- I don’t know! There's something inside that cave... As soon as you step in, you can feel there's something looking at you... Waiting for you to get desperately lost in the shadows and then consume you... It's horrible. It's something out of this world.” Her explanation turned into a desperate plight halfway through, letting them now that this wasn’t a prank or any of the sort.

Loudred had forgotten to close the door, and so everyone in the guild could hear what was happening, all of them exchanging worried glances for the safety of the rookies. “And you didn't even listen to my request of sending your best team and send off a pair of newcomers?!”

Chatot stared at her, finding himself stuck between a rock and a hard place. “How did you even know they were rookies?!”

“They told me! I met them while I was walking around and they told me it was their first mission! What were you thinking when you did that?!” Tears verging up in the corners of her eyes: not only was she going to lose her best friend, and perhaps something else, but also get two kids killed in the process.

Wigglytuff walked up to her and placed a comforting paw on her shoulder, crouching down. “Calm down. We will not let that happen. The bluff is close nearby, and today has been a slow day, meaning that most of the trainees and guildmembers are here.” She looked up at the mention of the word ‘trainees’, but he dismissed her worries with a smile. “Don’t misunderstand. Our members aren’t to be trifled with, even during their formation.” He stood up and looked at his right paw bird. “Chatot, go with Loudred and call the rest of guildmembers down here. We are forming a rescue party. And our destination… Is the Drenched Bluff.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now that wasn't so bad, now was it? (Actually it may have been) A lot of the dialogue during the later part was edited, to make less... cringy? Anyways, finally we're getting into some interesting stuff. What is it that could be waiting inside that cave? Soon enough, you'll know.


	4. Chapter 3 - Ambush

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rescue those in need and face one of the world's threats.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Had to rewrite most, if not the entirety of this chapter, since the pacing was really messed up... and it probably still will. Goodness gracious I forgot how much I've changed in these past years...

**Chapter 3**

**–**

**Ambush**

 

“Man, it's a beautiful day isn't it?” Eric asked as they walked down the steps. It was almost December, but there wasn't a single cloud in the blue sky that morning, his companion besides him enjoying the breathtaking sights as well. The sky was a clear blue, the same as her eyes.

“Yeah, it's a great day for a mission!” Eevee answered, smiling like a little kid as they got down the stairs. They saw someone walking around. It was a Chimchar. It had a really worried face, and she was pacing back and forward. Eric and Eevee stared at her.

“Who’s that?” The former asked, and the latter simply shook her head.

“No idea. Never seen her around town. Let’s go ask!” She approached the Chimchar and greeted her, Eric joining them just as she asked what was on her mind. “...you looked really worried!”

The chimchar looked at them. “What? No, no no no... It's just that... I'm worried about something…” She noticed their scarfs, on which she saw their Explorers badges shining under the sun. “Hey, you're explorers?”

Eevee nodded. “Yeah! We are Team Pokepals!” Eric rolled his eyes as he walked forward.

“We are a new exploration team from the guild up that hill. This morning we got a mission, in which we have to save someone in Drenched Bluff.” He said, a smile on his face. Eevee looked at him.

“Yeah! It's our first mission, and it's going to be awesome!”

“Yeah.” There was a long moment of silence as the Chimchar didn’t answer immediately. “Weeeee should get going…” The conversation had turned awkward in just a few lines, none of them sure of what to say. “That pokemon isn't going to be waiting there forever.”

They both began walking away from the crossroads and left town, waving goodbye to this Chimchar as they left for the Drenched Bluff.  

The Chimchar didn't respond, her that of pure horror, as if she had seen a ghost. “Oh no…”

* * *

 

Eric took in a deep breath as he left Treasure Town for the first time for as long as he could remember. The smell of the sea dispersed and gave way to that of grass from the ample green plains laid before their eyes, as far as the eye could see. To the west, some mountains obstructed their view, the river flowing down from that direction, though it was all too far away and littered by trees that blocked their sight, and to the east, forests and small mounds kept them from feasting on that world’s beauty. In front of them, not that far in the distance, they could see a couple of small forests, and deep within one of them a pile of rocks stuck out.

“Is that it?”  
  
“Yep! Told you it was nearby! I brought a map too. “ She pulled it out of her bag, which was hanging from her side, then carefully handed it over to him, making sure she didn’t bury her fangs into the thin paper. Once Eric got a good look at the map, he was surprised to see how big this region actually was. “The Sinnoh region… Huh. How many more are there?”

She turned around to look at him as they walked, taking it easy at first. “Uuuh… I think six so far. There’s a world map back in the guildmaster’s room, if you didn’t see it. Sinnoh is located to the south east of that map, and since we’re kinda close to the south pole winter can get pretty bad in the southern region. But we’re in the middle, so the temperature’s pretty good here, even in summer. Then you have Kanto and the ETF’s headquarters, where the Capital is located, Johto, which is really traditional, Hoenn is a mass of islands to the north of here, almost tropical, and then you have Unova and Kalos, which both share the same continent and have always been at war. It’s… a complicated story, but from what I’ve said things aren’t always peachy there, unlike here.. That’s all that has been discovered so far.”

“So far?”

“Yeah. The world’s a pretty big place, and with all that’s been happening.The government and the ETF have been doing their best to control the situation… but it’s hard. But that’s why we’re here! To help all of those we can on a daily basis!” She was really chirpy, and it was hard for Eric to hold back a smile. If he were to be honest, her excitement was slowly rubbing off on him. Still though, he had a few questions to ask her as they made their way to the Drenched Bluff.

“So… that’s it? You just want to help pokémon have better lives? That’s your whole reason to become an explorer?” She shot an inquiring glance at him, the Riolu raising his arms. “I mean, this is a job where you apparently endanger yourself constantly so… I’d expect you to have some other motivation. You aren’t exactly the… Uh…” He was struggling to put his next sentence into non-offensive terms. “You’re not the bravest one of the bunch.”

She didn’t answer, and instead stopped for a bit, then looked at Eric furiously. “I can’t always be a coward, can I? You’re being a jerk by asking all of these questions too.” She huffed and looked forward again, which didn’t really encourage Eric to keep talking, but… He didn’t really have anything else to do.

“You asked me earlier about my dreams and said that I was a human. What was that about?”

“Well, for starters, you said it wasn’t a dream, but rather a flashback… anyways, humans were ancient creatures that coexisted with pokémon a long time ago… and I mean, really long. Our culture and language seem to have come from them, so we think that they might’ve been more advanced than pokémon at the time, but our ancestors didn’t conserve any texts, so… We have no idea of what they did and why they suddenly up and vanished, leaving us pokémon here.” Eric’s eyes were glued to her side, and each time she faced him their eyes briefly met before she looked away, blushing. “Stop staring at me like that… I’m a bookworm, ok, what’s the problem?”  
  
“Nothing.” He looked forward again. “It’s just that you really know about a lot of things… hell, I’d dare guess that you know more about me than I do about you.” She groaned, realizing what his plan was: guilt tripping her to say something else.

“Alright, you want to know something else about me and my motivations? I’ll tell you then…” She sighed. “But only because you’re being a pain, understood? After this please don’t ask me ever again.” He nodded in response, though both knew that it’d be hard to do so if she said something. “I’m trying to figure out what happened to my family. I’m an orphan see, and the Kecleon brothers back in Treasure Town took me in and gave me a place to be and work at. I just… want to find out what happened to them, on top of figuring out what this rock’s all about and saving pokémon.”  
  
Their pace had slowed down considerably while they were talking, but after those words she hastened her step. “There, happy? Now come on, let’s go.” This was already going much worse than she had expected, her enthusiasm suddenly gone.

However, Eric was actually rather satisfied with the response, but he still felt bad for pushing her to that point, and quickly caught up to her. “Sorry, I didn’t know it was something so personal… Look, I’m pretty sure it’ll all work itself out: if we make a name for ourselves eventually someone’s bound to hear about us, and that way the answers will come to us.”

“Yes, that’s the plan I’ve been mapping out in my head for a very long time… saving others is an added plus. A really rewarding one, and one that I’d do nonetheless… But still an extra. My main goal is getting to that level and getting the answers I want.”

“And mine is to find out who I was I guess…” He regretted the fact that this was the only thing on his mind at the moment, because something inside of him was screaming at him to turn back, to not delve into his past and enjoy the moment, but he simply couldn’t let that desire die like that. “So, even though we have different reasons, we share the same goals.”

“That’s why I proposed that we make a team: you have nowhere to go, no idea of where you are or what you want to do… this way, we both can help each other mutually. And… there’s also the fact that you did save me from those bullies yesterday, and I simply had to reward you in some way, so…” She shook her head and looked at him. “Just, please don’t tell anyone that I’m in this for the fame or they’ll get the wrong idea, ok?” He nodded.

“Hey, I’m the same too… And I won’t tell anyone anything of what you just told me, so calm down.” She smirked, and thanked the Riolu for being so understanding of her position. With both of them feeling a bit better about each other, they hurried over to the forest where Drenched Bluff awaited. While they were traversing through the bushes however, Eric tripped on something, burying his muzzle into the mud underneath their feet.

“Whoa, you alright?” He stuck his muzzle out and wiped the mud off, the smell of swampy water reaching their nostrils and making them frown, but either way he nodded.

“Yeah… what did I step on anyways?” He shifted around and grabbed the object, pulling it out into view: a bag, very much like the one Eevee was carrying, but there was an emblem on it’s side: a flame with three slashes going through it. “Is this another team’s bag? How’d they get their own emblem?”  
  
“Must be someone important if that’s the case… what’s inside it?” Eevee quickly took the bag from his paws and rummaged through its interior, making the Riolu’s eyes widen.

“Hey now, what are you doing?”  
  
“Looking for anything resembling a badge or identification… that way we have another way to identify the team who owns this other than their emblem…” After a few minutes she groaned and pulled her head out. “No good, just food in there, not even a map.” Eric got back up and grabbed the bag to carry it himself.

“We’ll turn it in when we get to town. Maybe someone there will recognize it…” He pointed behind the Eevee, directing her gaze to the mound of rocks and moss behind her: Drenched Bluff. “That it?”  
  
“Yup… so close too… think it may be our target’s?” She motioned at the bag they had just recovered as they made their way to their first cave.

“So then they’re explorers? That makes… no sense. How come an exploration team would send a help request that way instead of asking directly?” She shrugged at his question, unsure of what to answer.  
“Guess we’ll have to ask them directly… now come on! We’re so close, I can taste the rewards! We’re rescuing a fellow exploration team Eric, this just got ten times more exciting!” Her peppiness was back once more, and he couldn’t help but smile as he followed he to the entrance. Drenched Bluff was nowhere close to the sea, but instead there was a small pond near the rock formation, which went underground. The strange shape of the formation itself, that of a half moon, had probably granted it it’s name, as it enveloped half of the pond while the other half kept accumulating dank water, explaining the muddy soil and the odour.

“Quaint little place… And it doesn’t seem like we’re alone either.” Eric tensed up as he said this, noticing a few prying eyes looking at them from the bushes, but they quickly retreated into the shadows of the forest.

“Most likely pokémon that live here… lately there’s been some pokémon that just straight up their towns and are now living in the wilderness… some call them primals. They attack you if you’re travelling around, and I’ve heard some really nasty stories… so let’s try to avoid them, ok?” Eric didn’t even have to look at her to guess she was shaking, keeping his eyes wide open as he inspected their surroundings as they walked into the cave. The wind’s gentle nudges and caresses turned into loud howls as they went in deeper, making the fox squeal in fear, getting even closer to Eric. This, not only further proved his point that she wasn’t made out for this, and made him feel even more sorry for her, but it also made him blush lightly.

“Uuh… Eevee? Not that close, please… Can’t properly move.” She looked up at him in refusal, but eventually backed away enough for the Riolu to move his feet freely. She was still uncomfortably close to him, but it was an upgrade from before. The darkness slowly swallowed them, and eventually both were forced to turn on their Luminous Orbs, a huge relief for the brown furred pokémon. She looked absolutely terrified of the darkness… but she hadn’t said anything earlier, and didn’t seem to have a problem while sleeping in the guild. It lead Eric to believe that she was either afraid of what could be waiting for them in there… or something else.

If they thought the smell was bad enough outside, it was because they didn’t know any better. The smells inside of that cave were bringing tears to their eyes, if anything because of how intense and pugnant the stench was. Water had definitely been stuck in that cave for far too long, but there was a certain character to the smell which didn’t make it completely unpleasant. They trudged onward through the mud and water, small rays of light slipping through cracks and showing them the way, and it seemed almost magical at times, how the light would disperse itself on the murky’s water surface, showing them the areas where the water was deeper and where it was safe. Eventually, they made it out of the water and onto a dry patch of land.

“Thank Arceus that’s over… My arms were getting tired.” Eric handed their bag to Eevee. After they had noticed the water was that deep, he had grabbed both of and carried them on his head as they trudged across so as to prevent their food from going bad.

“Yeah… hey, there’s an opening up ahead. C’mon!” She hurried forward without him and came out to a large chamber. The moment she did however, just outside of the light’s edge she could see a quadruped shape scuffling away slowly, sinking into darkness until it completely disappeared. At first, surprise jolted through her, then panic and finally sheer terror as a single pokémon came to mind, disturbing her to the point where she was immobile and stuck in place. So long she was like this that only when Eric got ahead and called her did she finally snap out of it.

“Looks like there’s only one way to go. The tunnels gave in.” He pointed at their surroundings, and just as he said, most of the other entrances were either flooded or littered with rocks, making them impossible to traverse. The only one which was dry was the one opposite to them, the furthest away from the hole in the ceiling, which Eric then directed his attention to.

“Weird that there’s something like this in a cave… almost as if something had smashed it’s way in here.” He looked at the pile of rubble directly below the hole, but shook his head. “Whatever. Come on, Elly, let’s go find our target and get out of here. This place’s starting to give me the creeps.” Just as he said this she looked at him, alarmed, and rushed to his side before she was left behind.

“So you saw it too?!”  
  
“Saw what?”

“That pokémon! I could’ve sworn I saw a quadruped head further in… the same way we’re going right now!” Eric rose an eyebrow and looked at the tunnel ahead, noticing how the light of their orbs died down the further in they went. He hit the orb with his paw repeatedly.

“Nope, didn’t… see… an- What’s wrong with this thing?!” He asked out loud, noticing how his orb blinked, and so did Eevee’s, which brought worry to their faces. As if on cue, a chill went down their spines as a cold current of air jabbed at their exposed backs, quickly turning on a dime to face the route they had come from. And this time Eric did see the paws slowly back into the darkness, but Elly saw something else: a faint purple light fading into the darkness. She started trembling uncontrollably, and Eric turned around and started walking in.

“Let’s go.”  
  
“But, I…”

“Eevee let’s go!” They both heard steps echoing behind them. “Now!” He didn’t have to tell her again, as the Eevee did what she knew best and started running for dear life. Adrenaline was pumping through their veins, unsure of how this opponent could’ve snuck up on them like this, and they didn’t seem to be letting up on their approach. As the lights in their orbs slowly grew dimmer, to the point where they could barely see two feet in front of them, the steps grew louder and quicker, now in a full on sprint as it tried to catch up to them, Eevee’s panic spreading to the Riolu. Whatever, or whoever it was, she knew them very well, too afraid to even speak or shout.

The walls around them disappeared as they came out to another opening, and all of a sudden the lights in their orbs went back to normal and the steps vanished. All of that in an instant. It took them a few more hurried steps to process that they were no longer being chased, but once they did they breathed a sigh of relief and sat down together, back to back. “Wh- what was that?”  
  
“I… don’t want to know.” Was her response, too shaken to say anything else. “Coming here was a bad idea… so much for this being an easy mission.” She wasn’t being inspiring at this point, and if anything she was only bringing his mood further down, but…

“We’re too far in to back down… literally. So let’s just do what we came to do here and go back home some other way. Now get up… the floor here’s also wet.” He said, looking at his paws, which had touched something on the ground. But when he looked at them, he was only greeted by a red fluid, which his mind immediately identified as the crimson liquid that flowed through them and gave them life. “What the… Blood?!” Eevee noticed this, looked down and panicked again, but she recovered in an extremely short amount of time, sniffing the air.

“No… not quite.” She looked around, and noticed a trail of it on the ground, exchanging a worried glance with Eric. He waved at her to keep quiet, and when she did so they both clearly heard a quiet groan, as if someone was waking up.

“Is… someone… there?” The voice echoed in the mostly empty chamber, safe for the stone pillars that kept the rocks above their heads, and not directly on top of them.

“H-Hello?” Eevee could barely utter the question as they searched for a source for that voice, and finally both noticed the pair of feet that stumbled out from behind one of the pillars. Their luminous orbs revealed the kneeling shape of a Meowth with a bag besides him, barely able to hold himself up. The reveal made Eevee jump out of her skin, and even surprised her Riolu partner, but the normal type quickly stepped forward.

“No, no wait! Calm down!” He was gasping for air. “Are you the rescue party? An exploration team?” They both weighed their options, unsure if they wanted to answer, but their silence was the only answer the Meowth needed before he cheered like a madman. “Oh thank Arceus, finally! I thought I was going to starve to death in this place!”

“Wait… so you’re the one we had to rescue?” Eevee was quite shocked, as she had been expecting someone much younger. “Well, so much for this being an easy task.”  
  
“Easy task? Taking down Aipom’s gang isn’t exactly easy, you hear me? Milly and I failed because of it…” Both of the Team Pokepals members were incredibly confused by all of these names and words that suddenly came their way, which made the Meowth chuckle. “Forgive me, I forgot to do a proper introduction: My name’s Mick, leader of Team Emberclaw. Me and my partner, Milly, were on a mission to apprehend Aipom as his gang of thieves, and we got notice that they were hiding out in this cave. When we got here however, they got the jump on us and beat me senseless, while Milly managed to run away. When I came to they were gone and when I tried to leave I heard voices coming down that hallway, so I guessed that’s where their hideout was.” He pointed down the way they had come, confusing the duo even further. “I’m amazed you took them all out on your own! You look… rather young!”

“Well… Uh, you see Mister Mick… We… uh…” Elly couldn’t find her words, and as such Eric decided to step forward and explain who they were, and why they had been elected to do that mission.

“I see… so you are just newbies… and you say Aipom and his crooks aren’t here? Really? Then whose voices was I hearing?”

“We don’t know if Aipom is here, but there’s definitely someone else out there… and it seems that’s our only way out of this cave.”

“Yeah, that is true… I wouldn’t be surprised if they had been waiting outside to get the jump on you two when you got in… We need retrace our steps with caution so as to not run into another ambush.”  
  
“Wait… you two are saying we need to go back through that hall!? No way!” Eevee’s sudden response caught both of them off guard, the older pokémon looking at her.

“But there’s no other way out. Come on, you’ve got me with you now, so I guarantee they won’t get the jump on us.” Eevee’s response was still a negative one, and Mick’s face of disapproval only made her understand that she was giving him a really bad first impression for being an explorer. “You can’t back out at the first sign of danger if you want to be an explorer kiddo. Besides, you’ve got your partner here.” He pointed at the Riolu, who was smiling at Eevee, trying to calm her down. “And as a partner, he’ll do everything he can to help you… so come on, get up, and let’s get out of this place. And when we do we can talk properly, deal?”

Even though they were in an extremely dire situation, the Meowth was keeping his cool extremely well, showing Eevee just how an explorer handled those moments… and it was certainly inspiring for her. Even if her legs were shaking, she stood back up and adjusted their bag before walking back into the tunnel. Eric lead the way, and Mick closed the line. Once again, as they started to make their way through the tunnel the light from their orbs started dying out, and eventually the steps returned.

“Damn it, they’re back!” Eric exclaimed, stopping for just a second, making both of his other companions freeze up as well. As they did so, however, Mick hushed them to listen to the darkness.

“It’s… gone?” The steps weren’t there anymore. “Start moving again.” The moment they started moving the steps returned, and when they stopped they disappeared, making Mick laugh really hard. “It was just our echo! There’s nothing to be scared of, you two!” His words certainly comforted them, and made the duo look like complete idiots, but he had more to say. “I can’t blame you though: your first mission and in a place like this, you must’ve gotten really nervous. Let’s get back to civilization and we can talk about how to keep your cool out in the field, alright?”

They all calmed down and began walking again, keeping an ear out for those steps. And as they finally came out to the next room, the steps disappeared, feeling that grip on their hearts vanishing. “That wasn’t so hard, now was it?” Mick was certainly trying to push them forward, and was being understanding of their condition as newcomers, which was just what they needed.

Eric and Elly laughed, finally relaxing as that ordeal was done and over with. “Ok… let’s just get home, call it a day, an-” As they were about to leave through the same route however, they heard voices coming from the other end of the tunnel that lead to the entrance. And this time it wasn’t their own.

“Are you sure you saw those two head in here?”  
  
“Yep… Looked like explorers to me, boss, just like the other two we beat up the other day.”   
  
Laughter could be heard. “Then let’s get in there and do the same! No one will find their bodies so deep inside the cave… this was such a great idea to use one of them as bait!” The voice of who they presumed was their leader sounded familiar to Mick, who frowned.

“Aipom.” That name made Eric and Eevee freeze up. “They’re coming back. We have to get out of here!” He looked around and stared at the hole in the ceiling, considering that as a possible escape route. Team Pokepals looked for any other alternatives, but it was worthless, as all of the other tunnels had crumbled down, and as such their only possible escape route was that hole.

“How are we going to get up there?!” Eevee asked while in the middle of a panic attack, pacing back and forth and getting as close as possible to them while they piled up on the rocks, trying to get Mick up to the hole. However, one of the rocks shook under their weight and rolled out underneath them, making the two bipeds fall down to the ground with a simultaneous groan.

“Agh, it’s no use! It’s too far up, and we’re all too short!”

“Or perhaps there just aren’t enough of you…” All three of them faced the entrance to the cave, and lo and behold, Aipom and his henchmen, three chinglings, a Lileep and an Anorith had caught up to them. The purple monkey had a nasty scar on his chest, which he exposed as he opened his arms and looked at the Meowth. “Mickey Mickey, about time you showed yourself! How long have you been holed up inside of this cave, hmm? Three days almost? I just can’t remember… But see, it’s given me enough time to think about how much I hate you, you piece of trash.” His grin  was so wide it was almost sickening, Eric clutching his fist at the sight.

“Aipom you scoundrel… Waiting for my partner to come back so you could finish her off?! You lowlife!”

“Ah, you’re too kind. And yes, I was waiting for her to come back… didn’t expect them to send fresh meat straight into the grinder though, that’s new.” He stared at the cowering Eevee and then at the defiant Riolu, frowning at the last one. “Looks like someone didn’t get the memo… Oh well, I’ll make sure that it’s the last thing you all remember.” They all backed away, and Eric stepped on something sharp on the ground, quickly glancing down to see what it was on pure instinct. What caught his eye, however, kept his attention there, instead of the incoming danger.

He saw a piece of gold, buried into the rock underneath the rubble. The rock rolling out from underneath their weight had revealed the fragment, which was encrusted into the earth. It looked sharp enough, and most likely could be used as a weapon. Without a second though, whilst Mick and Eevee pulled out their claws, having no other alternative, Eric crouched down and grabbed the fragment and ripped it out. He stumbled back as he did so, the fragment getting out with relative ease, and inspected it: it was much smaller than he had imagined, and knew it was useless as a weapon with that unique shape and size… and yet there was something strange about it, he couldn’t quite put his paw on it.

“Oooh, that looks valuable… Thanks for the find, kiddo!” Aipom exclaimed as he and his goons made their way towards them. “I’ll be sure to loot it off of your dead corpse once you die of starvation.” He laughed at his own plans. “Oh yeah, I don’t like getting blood on my hands… so I just let my prey die of starvation. That way I can sleep peacefully at night.” Eric readied himself too, gripping the fragment with strength. He’d try to use it as a weapon… but things were definitely looking grim.

Before the fight could begin however, they all noticed that illumination in the cave was slowly diminishing, and with it, the sounds of steps and whispers filled the empty space around them. “Wh- No way, an ambush?!” Aipom shouted, all of his lackeys looking around in a hurry. Eevee began trembling again, scared out of her mind as the whispers got louder. They all looked up and saw how a swirling black mist covered the hole, black as night, making the cave itself fall into darkness. The whispering became louder, almost as if someone was whispering right next to their ears, some twisting around to look behind them, so convinced there was something there. But all they could see was that black mist, twisting and churning in the air, enclosing on them… like a predator around it’s prey.

* * *

 

All of the guild members were rushing to the Drenched Bluff, across the green hills and along the dirt paths, going through any tall grass patches or running between trees in a forest. It didn't matter, none of them slowed down. They simply couldn’t. They had to get there or else those two could easily die, alongside Mick, something that Milly, the Chimchar, wasn’t going to allow. She was leading the group just as Chatot shouted from high above, exclaiming something about the cave shaking and trembling. They had no time to waste, and the entire guild marched forward as one unit, trying to close the gap as much as possible.

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And this is the place where things start taking a change and don't follow the plot of the game anymore! Yay! By the way, for those that are slightly confused: no, this isn't Dark Matter from Super Mystery Dungeon. That game didn't even exist when this chapter was written, so I had no way to know at the time that they'd use a concept like that.

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to “A Hero's Rebirth”. Thank you for reading the prologue of this story. As an interesting note, even though this fic was originally started in 2014, in 2015 once the first part was finished I went back to rewrite this chapter and the following five to... adapt it to what was my current writing style (my 2017 writing style is nowhere near as slow as this... and yes, I internally cringed when I was revising this text to publish it here, it was the main reason why it took so long in the first place, among other erasons I'll explain in another author's note).
> 
> Either way, once again, thanks for reading this Prologue, and I hope you come back at a later date for more!


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